Nicolas Sarkozy, former President of France, has been told he must report to prison to begin solitary confinement despite his pending appeal against his conviction for criminal conspiracy.
Nicolas Sarkozy has been ordered to report to La Santé Prison in southern Paris on October 21st to begin his five year prison sentence.
Sarkozy was spared the indignity of being taken from the Paris courtroom where he was convicted in September in handcuffs directly to prison and allowed to travel to the facility himself at the date now announced. Yet his being ordered to go to prison is nevertheless remarkable as the custodial sentence is not being held until the appeals process is complete.
The legal device used to activate the punishment while the case goes to appeal is unusual, but is the same used against French sovereigntist Marine Le Pen. The presidential candidate, who was convicted in an embezzlement case, had a judge order her ban on participating in any election begin immediately, even though she is appealing the conviction, which in normal times would be held until the legal process is exhausted.
Speaking at the time of Sarkozy’s conviction last month, Le Pen reflected of this apparent judicial activism which in her case would deny the French people the opportunity to vote for the poll-leading candidate for the next President of France, should a snap election take place: “this is a great danger with regard to the great principles of our law, first and foremost among which is the presumption of innocence.”
Former President Sarkozy will be held in solitary confinement once in prison, reports Le Figaro, as it is considered too dangerous for him to mix with the general prison population.
Coincidentally, the prison Sarkozy is being sent to is the same facility where a former “friend” of Jeffrey Epstein was discovered dead, hung in his cell, by prison guards in 2022. The modelling agent who was suspected of being a “pimp” to Epstein was being held on remand pending a court case over rapes of children where his relationship with the disgraced financier was to be discussed.
Sarkozy has protested his innocence and insists the legal campaign against him is politically motivated, and an act of revenge. As reported at the time of his conviction:
Sarkozy said the initial claims against him, now made well over a decade ago, were fakes by the Libyan government “Gaddafi clan” and its agents as an act of revenge against him, because he’d sided with rebels during the Arab Spring and had supported the notion of getting Colonel Gaddafi out of power. This is not exactly proven, but the court has latterly acknowledged that some of the earliest documents making allegations against Sarkozy are in fact fakes.
Sarkozy decried what he called a political witch-hunt against him from the court house on Thursday and railed against the judges. He said even if he had to go to prison, he would do so with his conscience clear. Sarkozy thundered: “If they absolutely want me to sleep in prison, I will sleep in prison. But with my head held high. I am innocent. This injustice is a scandal.
French broadsheet Le Figaro reports Sarkozy warned the public that: “What happened today is extremely serious for the rule of law, for the confidence we can have in justice” and vowed he would appeal to prove his “innocence”. He continued: “I ask the French people – whether they voted for me or not, whether they support me or not – to grasp what has just happened. So, hatred truly knows no limits”.
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