<div><p>A French court has rejected an appeal by the widow of the 10th Earl of Shaftesbury, who was convicted for plotting to murder the aristocrat in 2004, making her 20-year prison sentence final.</p><p>The court rejected former nightclub hostess Jamila M'Barek's appeal on Wednesday, more than five years after the killing.</p><p>M'Barek and her Tunisian brother Mohamed were jailed for 25 years in 2007 for plotting to kill 66-year-old Anthony Ashley-Cooper, out of fear an impending divorce would threaten her inheritance.</p><p>Her sentence was reduced last year from 25 years to 20 in an earlier appeal.</p><p>Believing her to be pregnant, the earl wrote her into his will when they married in 2002, leaving her a large chunk of his multi-million dollar estate. But in 2004 their marriage broke down and he was seeing another woman.</p><p>The earl's decomposing body was found in April 2005 on a patch of wasteland on the French Riviera, five months after he disappeared from his home in Cannes. Forensic tests showed he had been strangled.</p><p>M'Barek has said she was only an eyewitness to a scuffle that turned violent.</p><img src="http://admatch-syndication.mochila.com/images/ad.gif?aid=67462101&bid=informcom" /></div><div id="copyright"><div>

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