PARIS — Nicolas Sarkozy will become the first former French president in modern history to step into a prison cell on Tuesday, the former president indicated over the weekend.
Sarkozy — once a star figure of French conservatism — was sentenced to five years in prison last month for allegedly having permitted his “close collaborators” and “unofficial intermediaries” to attempt to obtain financial backing from Moammar Gadhafi’s regime in Libya in exchange for economic and diplomatic favors as he prepared for his first presidential campaign ahead of 2007.
Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin, who served as Sarkozy’s spokesperson in 2014 and with whom he has remained close, said he had met with Sarkozy since the guilty verdict and would also visit him in prison out of “concern for his security.”
Sarkozy said in an interview with Sunday paper La Tribune Dimanche that he will serve his sentence in the Prison de la Santé, the only prison located within the Paris’ city limits.
He will become the first French head of state to step behind bars since Nazi collaborator Philippe Pétain, who signed the French armistice with Germany in 1940. Pétain’s legacy is now firmly associated with collaboration and one of the darkest chapters in French history.
It’s unclear how long Sarkozy will remain incarcerated. Once behind bars, he will be able to request a sentence adjustment, which could allow him to serve his sentence differently, for example at home with an electronic bracelet.
Sarkozy has appealed the verdict and repeatedly professed his innocence, but the three-judge panel that heard the case found that the seriousness of the charges warranted Sarkozy’s immediate imprisonment, despite his appeal.
Appeals in France typically allow defendants to delay any punishments until the appeals process is concluded. Appeal dates are also set on shorter deadlines for people being held while awaiting their new trial.
Though the ex-president has had several run-ins with the law since leaving office in 2012, he remains an influential figure on the French right. He met with new Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu shortly after his appointment in September and with Jordan Bardella, the president of the far-right National Rally, in August.
In an interview with conservative daily Le Figaro, Sarkozy said he spoke on the phone with the National Rally’s Marine Le Pen — who was sentenced earlier this year for allegedly having embezzled funds from the European Parliament — and his former prime minister, François Fillon, who has also been convicted for embezzling public funds.
Le Pen has appealed her sentencing and continues to say she is innocent. Fillon has exhausted all his appeals.
Sarkozy was definitively found guilty of corruption in a separate case after exhausting all appeals earlier this year, which led him to briefly being placed under house arrest. A French supreme court is also set to render a final verdict on Nov. 26 in a case related to campaign finance law violations allegedly committed during his second presidential run in 2012, in which he was previously found guilty by two lower courts. Sarkozy has repeatedly said he is innocent in both those cases as well.
In the Gadhafi trial, Sarkozy was cleared of corruption charges, as the court could not establish that the alleged deal between Sarkozy’s associates and Libya had continued once Sarkozy took office, presiding judge Nathalie Gavarino explained as she unveiled the verdict.
The court’s ruling indicated that it could neither establish nor rule out whether Libyan money had reached Sarkozy’s 2007 campaign.
In his Le Figaro interview, Sarkozy said he would be bringing a copy of Alexandre Dumas’ “The Count of Monte Cristo,” which tells the story of a man who escapes prison after being falsely accused of treason and locked up without trial, along with a biography of Jesus Christ.
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