[3] The circumstances of the marriage, along with substantial public scrutiny by political enemies, however, opened up lines of attack against the couple in terms of moral corruption.

[5] Henriette Caillaux made no attempt to escape and newspaper workers in adjoining offices quickly apprehended her and summoned a doctor and the police.

[7] After substantial publicity and a lengthy investigation, her trial opened at the Paris Cour d'assises on 20 July 1914, where it promptly dominated French news.

[8] The trial, which included a sexual scandal and a crime passionel by a society French lady, received twice as many column inches in Le Temps as the ongoing July Crisis which culminated in the First World War, even as late as three days before the start of hostilities.

[9] Because of the lax legal and procedural restraints in the cour d'assises, the conduct of the trial "seemed almost structured for drama [and] given a certain kind of case, it could produce a spectacle more compelling than anything the theatres could provide".

[10] The president of the Republic, Raymond Poincaré, made a deposition at the trial, an unheard-of occurrence at a criminal proceeding almost anywhere, and many of the participants were among the most powerful members of French society.

The defence, coupled with the emergence of sociological theories of criminology which attributed criminal action to environmental and unconscious factors and the traditional narrative of women ruled by their passions, helped her secure acquittal on 28 July 1914.