They sentence Nicolás Sarkozy to hard prison: he won’t go to jail, but he will have to use an electronic anklet

The French justice sentenced former president Nicolas Sarkozy (2007-2012) on appeal this Wednesday to three years in prison, including a mandatory one, for corruption and influence trading in case of “listening”. Magistrates handed down the same sentence as the first instance in March 2021.

The former president will not go to jail as the appeal process continues, but he will have to wear an electronic anklet; first time for a French president.

This is the confirmed sentence that French justice inflicted on Sarkozy for the so-called “interception case” and which the president previously received in the first instance in March 2021.

Sarkozy thus becomes the first former president of the Fifth Republic sentenced to hard prison although you can still appeal to the Supreme Court and also, the year still, you can comply with the electronic bracelet on trial.

The case of wiretaps one of several legal proceedings that concerns Sarkozy dates back to the beginning of 2014 and other cases converge in which the former president was involved.

At the time, the judicial system was investigating Sarkozy for the Bettencourt case for abuse of weakness of the L’Oréal heiress, for which he was finally cleared.

Sarkozy then wanted the courts to annul the seizure of his presidential diaries and to recover them he appealed to the Supreme Court.

Uneasy about the appeal and the development of the case, Sarkozy asked his friend and lawyer Thierry Herzog to use his friendship with prosecutor Gilbert Azibert to get information about the atmosphere in court and probably, influence your decision.

Sarkozy and his lawyer communicated through a secret telephone line Registered under the assumed name of Paul Bismuth.

you listen to them

But the judges, who were investigating Sarkozy in the case of Libyan financing of his 2007 election campaign, They found that other line out of the wayry they poked her.

It was then that the magistrates discovered that Sarkozy intended to offer the prosecutor a career boost through a run for the Munich State Council in exchange for helping him with his agenda.

Sarkozy’s defense he always claimed that wiretapping was illegal and that there was no evidence in the telephone conversations of said exchange of favours.

In addition, the lawyers complained that the quotes read during the trial were extracted from the tapes they were out of context.

In them Sarkozy can be heard saying phrases such as “I’ll take care of it because I’m going to Monaco and I will see the prince” referring to Albert II.

In this last test it was possible to listen to the live recordings. But even Sarkozy has argued in his defense that this alleged exchange of favours never happened: neither the prosecutor got the job in Monaco nor Sarkozy won the appeal for his agendas.

The judges, when they sentenced him for the first time, remembered him the intention to commit said offense is sufficientregardless of the outcome, and underlined the seriousness of being a head of state.

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