France’s former president Nicolas Sarkozy is set to begin a prison sentence on Tuesday, October 21, after being convicted of criminal conspiracy in connection with alleged Libyan funding for his 2007 presidential campaign, making him the first ex-head of an EU nation to serve time behind bars.
Sarkozy, who led France from 2007 to 2012, was found guilty in late September over a scheme involving late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s regime, which prosecutors said helped finance his electoral victory. The 69-year-old, who has denounced the ruling as an “injustice,” has appealed the decision but will still be incarcerated at Paris’s La Santé Prison.
“If they absolutely want me to sleep in prison, I will sleep in prison, but with my head held high,” Sarkozy said following the September 25 verdict.
He will be the first French leader to be jailed since Philippe Pétain, the Nazi collaborationist head of the Vichy regime during World War II. Sources told AFP that Sarkozy will likely be placed in a nine-square-metre solitary confinement cell to ensure he avoids interaction with other inmates or being secretly photographed with smuggled mobile phones.
The duration of his imprisonment remains uncertain. Presiding judge Nathalie Gavarino described his offences as being of “exceptional gravity,” ordering his detention even if an appeal was filed. However, Sarkozy’s legal team is expected to immediately request his release once he arrives at the facility. The appeals court will have two months to review that request, which could result in Sarkozy being freed under judicial supervision or placed under house arrest with an ankle tag.
Until then, the former president is expected to spend much of his time in isolation, allowed out of his cell for a daily walk alone in a small courtyard.
Sarkozy’s conviction is the latest in a series of legal troubles that have dogged him since leaving office in 2012. He has already been found guilty in two other cases, including a corruption trial in which he tried to obtain confidential information from a judge. He served part of that sentence under house arrest with an electronic monitor before its removal in May.
In the so-called “Libyan case,” prosecutors claimed Sarkozy’s associates, acting with his knowledge, struck an illegal funding deal with Gaddafi in 2005 to bankroll his 2007 campaign. In exchange, France allegedly agreed to help rehabilitate Gaddafi’s global image following his government’s role in the 1988 Lockerbie and 1989 Niger airliner bombings.
The court, however, did not conclude that Sarkozy personally received or used Libyan funds. He was acquitted of embezzling Libyan public money, passive corruption, and illegal campaign financing.
Following his earlier graft conviction, Sarkozy was stripped of the Legion of Honour, France’s highest award. Despite his mounting legal troubles, he retains some popularity among conservative voters.
According to a recent Elabe poll of over 1,000 adults, six in ten French citizens believe the new sentence is “fair.” His son, Louis Sarkozy, has called on supporters to “come and show support” for his father outside his home on Tuesday morning.
Meanwhile, Judge Gavarino has received death threats since the verdict, prompting President Emmanuel Macron to condemn the intimidation as “unacceptable.”
La Santé Prison has previously held several high-profile inmates, including Venezuelan militant Ilich Ramirez Sánchez, better known as “Carlos the Jackal.” More recently, French model agent Jean-Luc Brunel, a close associate of convicted US s3x offender Jeffrey Epstein, was found dead in his cell there in 2022 while awaiting trial for the r@pe of minors.
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