{"id":393679,"date":"2026-01-05T18:42:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-05T18:42:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/393679\/"},"modified":"2026-01-05T18:42:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-05T18:42:09","slug":"paris-court-finds-10-guilty-of-cyberbullying-frances-first-lady-brigitte-macron","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/393679\/","title":{"rendered":"Paris court finds 10 guilty of cyberbullying France’s first lady Brigitte Macron"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Paris<\/a> court has found 10 people guilty of cyberbullying<\/a> France’s first lady, Brigitte Macron, by spreading false online claims about her gender and sexuality, including allegations she was born a man.One defendant was sentenced<\/a> on Monday to six months in prison, while eight were handed suspended sentences between two and eight months. All 10 were mandated to attend cyberbullying awareness training.<\/p>\n

The court pointed to “particularly degrading, insulting, and malicious” comments referring to false claims regarding alleged trans identity and alleged paedo criminality targeting Mrs Macron. “Repeated publications have had cumulative harmful effects,” the court said.<\/p>\n

\"\"\/French President Emmanuel Macron’s wife Brigitte Macron. (AP)The defendants, eight men and two women aged 41 to 65, were accused of having posted numerous comments falsely claiming that President Emmanuel Macron<\/a>‘s wife was born a man and likening their 24-year age gap to paedophilia. Some of the posts were viewed tens of thousands of times.<\/p>\n

Mrs Macron did not attend the two-day trial in October. Speaking on TF1 national television on Sunday, she said she launched legal proceedings to “set an example” in the fight against harassment.<\/p>\n

Her lawyer, Jean Ennochi, said on Monday “what is important is that there are immediate cyberbullying awareness trainings, and for some of the defendants, a ban on using their social media accounts”.<\/p>\n

Her daughter, Tiphaine Auzi\u00e8re, testified about what she described as the “deterioration” of her mother’s life since the online harassment intensified.<\/p>\n

“She cannot ignore the horrible things said about her,” Auzi\u00e8re told the court. She said the impact has extended to the entire family, including Mrs Macron’s grandchildren.<\/p>\n

One of the defendants, a property asset manager, received a six-month prison sentence. Under French law, the sentence may be served at home, possibly while wearing an ankle monitor or following other requirements set by a judge.<\/p>\n

\"\"\/Defendant Delphine Jegousse, 51, who is known as Amandine Roy and describes herself as a medium and an author. (AP)<\/p>\n

Defendant Delphine Jegousse, 51, who is known as Amandine Roy and describes herself as a medium and an author, is considered to have played a major role in spreading the rumour after she released a four-hour video on her YouTube channel in 2021. She was given a six-month prison sentence.<\/p>\n

The X account of Aur\u00e9lien Poirson-Atlan, 41, known as Zo\u00e9 Sagan on social media, was suspended in 2024 after his name was cited in several judicial investigations. Poirson-Atlan was given an eight-month prison sentence, along with another defendant, a gallery owner.<\/p>\n

The one defendant not given a prison sentence was a teacher, who apologised during the trial. He will have to attend the cyberbullying awareness training.<\/p>\n

Several will see their online access suspended for six months on the social media platform where they made their posts.<\/p>\n

The sentences were proportional to the seriousness of the comments, the court stressed.<\/p>\n

French judicial authorities didn’t disclose the names of the defendants, but some made their names public by speaking out<\/p>\n

During the trial, several defendants told the court their comments were intended as humour or satire and said they did not understand why they were being prosecuted.<\/p>\n

\"\"\/Defendant Bertrand Scholler answers reporters after a Paris court has found 10 people guilty of cyberbullying France’s first lady, Brigitte Macron. (AP)<\/p>\n

The case follows years of conspiracy theories falsely alleging that Mrs Macron was born under the name Jean-Michel Trogneux, which is actually the name of her brother. The Macrons have also filed a defamation suit in the United States against conservative influencer Candace Owens.<\/p>\n

The Macrons, who have been married since 2007, first met at the high school where he was a student and she was a teacher. Mrs Macron, 24 years her husband’s senior, was then called Brigitte Auzi\u00e8re, a married mother of three.<\/p>\n

Mr Macron, 48, has been France’s president since 2017.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Paris court has found 10 people guilty of cyberbullying France’s first lady, Brigitte Macron, by spreading false…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":393680,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-393679","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393679","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=393679"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/393679\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/393680"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=393679"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=393679"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=393679"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}