François Fillon, once a leading figure in French politics and a former Prime Minister, has been handed a four-year suspended prison sentence by France’s highest appeals court. This marks the latest chapter in a years-long scandal that upended his 2017 presidential campaign.
The case, dubbed “Penelopegate,” centers on accusations that Fillon provided a fictitious parliamentary assistant job to his wife, Penelope Fillon, for which she was paid more than a million euros in public funds without performing the responsibilities the role required.
On June 17, 2025, the Court of Cassation confirmed the sentence, which includes a €375,000 fine and a five-year ban on running for any public office.
Although Fillon, now 71, will not serve any jail time due to the fully suspended sentence, the ruling underscores the severe ethical breaches committed during his political career. Penelope Fillon, originally from the United Kingdom, also received a two-year suspended sentence and an identical fine.
The allegations date back to revelations first published by French satirical paper Le Canard Enchaînéin January 2017, which reported that Penelope Fillon had been paid hundreds of thousands of euros over several years for a position she appeared never to have fulfilled.
Investigations revealed that she lacked even basic credentials like a National Assembly pass card and had no documented responsibilities tied to her job title.
The public response was swift and unforgiving, with Fillon’s campaign marred by protests and chants of “Rends l’argent” (“Give back the money”).
The scandal ultimately derailed his presidential ambitions, as he was eliminated in the first round of voting with just over 20% of the vote, an unprecedented setback for France’s conservative right since the birth of the Fifth Republic in 1958.
This week’s ruling follows a complex legal journey. In 2020, Fillon was sentenced to five years in prison, two of them suspended.
That decision was appealed, and in 2022, a new verdict reduced the prison time to one year without suspension, alongside the same financial penalties. However, the Court of Cassation later deemed the prison sentence unjustified and ordered another retrial, leading to the fully suspended sentence now in place.
Throughout the case, both Fillon and his wife have insisted that she carried out legitimate work related to constituency oversight and communication.
“The treatment I received was somewhat unusual and nobody will convince me otherwise,” Fillon said in response to the court’s decision.
“Perhaps there was a link with me being a candidate in the presidential election.” He has described the five-year political ineligibility as “a deep moral wound,” he added.
Fillon’s defense lawyer, Antonin Lévy, welcomed the latest ruling. “François Fillon is a free man. There is no prison sentence, no electronic bracelet. This decision puts the case back in its proper place,” he said.
The scandal’s reverberations continue to echo in French politics. Other high-profile figures have faced similar scrutiny, including former President Nicolas Sarkozy, Fillon’s one-time political ally.
He was stripped of his Légion d’Honneur following a graft conviction, and far-right leader Marine Le Pen, who is currently appealing a verdict in a fake job case involving European Parliament funds.
Adding further complexity, Fillon had previously agreed to repay nearly €70,000 to the French state in a separate 2017 case involving public funds used to employ writer Maël Renouard, who had assisted him in writing a book.
With this final ruling, François Fillon avoids imprisonment but remains politically sidelined, his legacy clouded by one of France’s most high-profile political scandals in recent memory.
