The CEO of Fimalac and owner of “La Revue des deux mondes” had admitted having hired in 2012 the wife of François Fillon at the request of her husband for a salary of 3900 euros net monthly. He admitted “slightly excessive remuneration” this Thursday in “Complementary investigation”.
He had never yet delivered his vision of the Penelope Fillon affair. Marc Ladreit de Lacharrière, a businessman close to the former Prime Minister when he was at Matignon, admitted having paid his wife excessively and then fictitiously.
The twentieth fortune of France in 2022 was sentenced in 2018 to an eight-month suspended prison sentence and a fine of 375,000 euros for misuse of corporate assets.
“He was accused of a slightly excessive remuneration for part of the work of François Fillon’s wife. She had considered herself to be closeted”, judged the CEO of Fimalac on France 2 Thursday evening in the program Further investigation.
3900 euros net per month
Owner of The Journal of Two WorldsMarc Ladreit de Lacharrière had admitted before the Court of Paris to have hired the wife of François Fillon in 2012 and 2014 at the request of her husband.
Indicted in April 2017 for “abuse of social assets”, the billionaire was suspected of having offered a job of convenience to Pénélope Fillon. During the investigation, he had taken on this job while contesting its fictitious nature.
The wife of the former Prime Minister admitted for her part that she had never been to the premises of the Review of the two worlds, while indicating that he had written several reading notes. Only two were published under the pseudonym of Pauline Camille.
As for the mission of editorial advice which had been entrusted to her, the Franco-British had indicated that she had been “disappointed not to be more solicited” when she had never met the editorial director or his colleagues. Pénélope Fillon had also described her salary of 3900 euros net monthly as “generous”.
“Oral” advice to Marc Ladreit de Lacharrière “4 or 5 times”
This law graduate had also explained to the investigators that her work as a literary adviser consisted of delivering “oral advice only given” to Marc Ladreit de Lacharrière”, which she said she had done “4 or 5 times”.
The Attorney General had denounced during the couple’s appeal trial in 2022 a “use of pure convenience”.
“A slightly different case”
If the billionaire who now says he is “much less close to François Fillon” has been sentenced through a plea-guilty procedure which amounts to recognizing the facts, Marc Ladreit de Lacharrière now denies any fictitious employment.
“She had considered herself to be closeted. However, it so happens that according to the Montaigne Institute, there are 200,000 people in France. The case is a little different because it is the wife of ‘a presidential candidate,’ said the billionaire.
François Fillon was sentenced to four years in prison, including one firm, by the Paris Court of Appeal last May, as well as a fine of 375,000 euros and ten years of ineligibility last May in second instance. His wife, Penelope Fillon, received a two-year suspended prison sentence. Through the voice of his lawyers, the former Prime Minister announced in the process to appeal to the Court of Cassation.
A few weeks before the 2017 presidential election, The chained Duck revealed that Pénélope Fillon had been paid for years with her husband’s parliamentary envelope: 600,000 euros in salary for almost non-existent parliamentary assistance work, according to the newspaper. In total, the sums collected would amount to more than one million euros.
