The national financial prosecutor’s office closed, on Friday December 13, the preliminary investigation for “embezzlement of public funds” targeting François Fillon. This concerned the hiring of Maël Renouard as a parliamentary assistant to write “Faire”, his book program for the 2017 presidential election.
Nearly eight years later, François Fillon is determined to settle his legal and financial affairs. All his affairs… A few weeks after opening negotiations with the National Assembly with a view to “returning the money” unduly received by his wife Penelope, the former Prime Minister also chose to settle another file which could have leading him to appear in court once again for “embezzlement of public funds”.
This is the file of Maël Renouard, named after his former parliamentary assistant who helped him, between 2013 and 2015, to write Faire its program book with a view to the 2017 presidential election. On the sidelines of “Penelopegate”, the national financial prosecutor’s office had, in fact, opened a preliminary investigation on this subject in April 2017. It was a question for justice to verify whether it was normal for Maël Renouard to be paid from the funds of the National Assembly as a parliamentary assistant with the mission of writing a political book used in the 2017 presidential campaign.
“A memorandum of understanding has been signed”
According to information from BFMTV, the national financial prosecutor’s office closed this investigation without further action this Friday, December 13. But the financial magistrates did not make this decision without reason. Beforehand, they obtained the guarantee that François Fillon would reimburse the National Assembly for the salaries received at the time by Maël Renouard.
What a source close to the matter confirms to BFMTV: “Yes, a memorandum of understanding was signed between the Assembly and Mr. Fillon regarding the Renouard file,” she indicates. “This protocol provides for the payment of around 75,000 euros. And it has started to be executed…” Employed as a parliamentary assistant, Maël Renouard had received between 60 and 70,000 euros in salary from the National Assembly for half time. His mission was therefore to lay the foundations of François Fillon’s book which sold more than 100,000 copies and brought the former Baron de la Sarthe the tidy sum of 300,000 euros.
The job “exclusively dedicated to writing a book”
“The investigations made it possible to confirm that the employment of Maël Renouard had been exclusively dedicated to the writing of a book in the sole interest of the candidate François Fillon, characterizing the offense of embezzlement of public funds by the deputy,” indicates the national financial prosecutor’s office at BFMTV.
“However, it appeared proportionate to proceed with a classification of this procedure, conditional on the reimbursement by François Fillon of the salary and social security contributions.”
So here is the threat of a new trial which is receding for the former Prime Minister. All he has to do now is find another agreement to pay off his debt corresponding to his wife Penelope’s fictitious jobs. As BFMTV revealed on November 12, this is still under discussion. It concerns an amount of nearly 700,000 euros
