Ten people went on trial in Paris on Monday for allegedly harassing President Emmanuel Macron’s wife, Brigitte Macron, by spewing malicious rumors that she is really a man.
The eight men and two women have been accused of sexist cyber-harassment after they allegedly played a major role in fueling claims online about the French first lady’s gender and sexuality, according to French prosecutors.
The defendants also attacked the first lady’s 24-year age gap with her husband — describing it as “pedophilia.”
The defendants, who are facing two years in prison if convicted, include a self-described spiritual medium, an advertising executive, an elected official, a teacher and a computer scientist.
It wasn’t immediately clear if Brigitte planned to attend the trial.
The two-day trial comes after the Macrons slapped conservative influencer Candace Owens with a defamation lawsuit back in July after she started sowing doubts about the 72-year-old first lady’s biological gender.
The lawsuit seeks “substantial” damages from the right-leaning political commentator — whose YouTube boasts some 4.5 million subscribers — if she doesn’t stop spreading the false claims.
The Macrons have long been dogged by conspiracy theories that Brigitte was born a man named Jean-Michel Trogneux, which is actually the name of her brother.
Brigitte and her brother won a defamation suit last year against two women who had been spreading the claims online.
A Paris appeals court overturned the ruling in July but Brigitte and her brother are appealing the decision.
The French power couple, who have been married since 2007, first met at the high school where he was a student and she was a teacher.
With Post wires
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: nypost.com
