Corruption and impact pedaling | Nicolas Sarkozy sentenced to three years in prison

ANNE LEC’HVIEN
France Media Agency

Mr. Sarkozy, 66, will not go to jail, however, no warrant is required.

As president from 2007 to 2012, he became the second former head of state to be granted justice, after his former mentor, Jacques Chirac, was sentenced in December 2011 to two years in prison and embezzlement for embezzlement of public funds.

Mr Sarkozy, who has always said he did not commit “the slightest act of corruption,” appeared before the court and his sentence seemed vague. The former moderate president and his lawyers left the room and made no statement.

Historic counsel for former High Magistrate Gilbert Azibert and former President Thierry Herzog, the judges imposed a 5-year professional ban on the same sentence. They were found guilty of violating professional privacy.

The criminal court considered the “corruption deal” between the three people to be over. However, he withdrew at the request of the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF), seeking the same four-year prison sentence, two of whom were adamant on the charges, believing the president’s image was “damaged”. “With devastating effects” by this affair.

This first confidence in Nicolas Sarkozy comes from the March 17 trial of the “Big Malian” case, when he had to face the judges again in connection with his 2012 presidential election campaign expenses.

Retired from politics in 2016, but still very popular and heard on the right, a year before the next presidential election, Nicolas Sarkozy is under strong legal pressure. He has been embroiled in a number of cases, including a suspected Libyan financing of a successful 2007 campaign.

He was wired up in 2013 in the wake of the latter case.

Judges find that Nicolas Sarkozy is using a secret telephone line open under the “Paul Bismuth” alias to communicate with his lawyer, Thierry Herzog.

Ten of their conversations were transliterated.

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The judges considered the former president guilty of corruption, assuring him that he would support Mr. Azibert’s candidacy for the prestigious position in Monaco, for special information, which also had an impact on the cassation appeal he filed.

The former tenant of the Elysee then sought to rescind the seizure of his presidential agendas after his dismissal in the Bettencourt case. Gilbert Azibert, the General Councilor in the Civil Chamber, did not directly intervene in the case, but according to the court he played on his relations.

During the trial, which ended on December 10, the defense protested a case based on “fantasies” and “hypotheses” and agreed to release the defendants.

In the end, she argued that Nicolas Sarkozy had not won before the High Court and that Gilbert Azibert had never held office in Monaco. By law, to classify crimes of corruption and impact pedaling, it is not necessary to obtain probation or the effect is factual.

Throughout the trial, in a hurricane-like environment, the defense hit the “garbage” file, demanding that the entire process be terminated on the basis of “illegal” wiretapping, because it violated the privacy of the exchange between a lawyer and his client.

In this tense context, the owner of this Financial Prosecutor’s Office, Jean-Franకోois Bohnert, personally arrived on the day of the indictment to defend his organization and confirm: “No one here is taking revenge on the former President of the Republic”.