“Pressures” in the Fillon case: the defense requests the “reopening” of the trial

The judgment was expected next Monday. François Fillon's lawyers asked the Paris criminal court to reopen the trial of the ex-prime minister on Tuesday after recent statements about "pressure" during the investigation.

In a statement, the defense said it wanted "recent events to be discussed between all parties", while the former head of the National Financial Prosecutor's Office assured having conducted the investigation under "pressure" from the General Prosecutor's Office to escalate informations.

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This announcement by the lawyers of François Fillon, his wife Penelope and the former deputy of the deputy in Sarthe, Marc Joulaud, poses a major uncertainty about the rendering of the judgment, expected at 13:30 Monday, in this case concerning suspicions of fictitious jobs by Penelope Fillon.

Avalanche of reactions

Eliane Houlette, retired for a year, was moved on June 10 before a parliamentary commission of "very close control" that would have exercised the public prosecutor's office, its direct supervisory authority, in the conduct of investigations launched in the countryside 2017 presidential election.

Friday, she clarified that these pressures were "not on the facts alleged against Mr. Fillon or on the merits of the prosecution", but "were purely procedural." "Mr. Fillon was not charged at the request or under pressure from the executive," she insists.

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His first statements, however, sparked an avalanche of political reactions criticizing the instrumentalization of justice in this ultra-sensitive affair.

And Friday evening, the Head of State Emmanuel Macron asked for an opinion to the Superior Council of Magistracy (CSM) to verify that the National Financial Prosecutor's Office carried out its investigation "in all serenity, without pressure" from the executive.