PARIS – Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy appeared in a Paris courtroom on Monday to face charges of corruption and influence as years of protracted legal involvement came to a head, despite his continued influence and popularity on the right.
Sarkozy, 65, who was French President from 2007 to 2012, arrived under tight security at the main court in Paris without speaking to a crowd of reporters who had gathered there. He is charged with illegally attempting to obtain information from a judge about another lawsuit against him in exchange for promising to use his influence to secure prestigious jobs for the judge.
Only one other president in recent French history has been brought to justice: Jacques Chirac, who was convicted in 2011 for embezzling and misusing public funds as Mayor of Paris. Mr Chirac was the first French head of state to stand trial since Marshal Philippe Pétain was found guilty of treason for collaborating with Nazi Germany at the end of World War II.
However, Mr Chirac was tried in absentia due to poor mental health.
Under French law, a person convicted of corruption can face a prison sentence of up to 10 years and a fine of € 1 million, or approximately $ 1.2 million, while influencing the person can face up to five years in prison and a fine 500,000 euros can be punished.
The study, which was originally supposed to last until December 10th, could be postponed due to the coronavirus pandemic. Gilbert Azibert’s lawyers – the 73-year-old judge accused of involvement in the corruption case alongside Mr Sarkozy and his attorney Thierry Herzog – say he is too threatened by the virus to attend due to heart and respiratory problems Sessions in court.
After a brief hearing, the court stayed the case and postponed a decision on a possible postponement until Thursday, when a medical report on Mr. Azibert is due.
Mr Sarkozy, a combative Conservative politician who lost his bid for re-election in 2012 and whose comeback attempt in 2016 failed, has denied misconduct in a complex web of financial inappropriateness that has plagued him since leaving office.
Last month, prosecutors brought new charges against him in one of the longest-running and most serious cases, alleging that his 2007 campaign received illegal Libyan funding from the regime of the late strongman Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi .
Mr Sarkozy has been charged on the case, but leaks in the French news media suggest there is little concrete evidence to date of his direct involvement in the alleged funding system, and one of the key witnesses recently retracted some of his allegations against the former president.
“How long are we going to use taxpayers’ money to prove by all means that I am corrupt?” An angry Mr. Sarkozy said in an interview on news channel BFM TV this month.
“The French need to know whether you like me or not – I’ve made a lot of mistakes and probably a lot of mistakes – I’m not a crook,” he added.
The case, which began on Monday and is known as the “wiretapping matter”, is the first against him to be finally brought to trial as Mr Sarkozy – a former attorney – used all available legal remedies to initiate proceedings.
Although the cases are separate, the wiretapping emerged from the investigation that began in Libya in 2013 and prompted investigators to wiretap the phones of Mr. Sarkozy and Mr. Herzog, his lawyer.
According to the prosecutor, in 2014 investigators found that Mr Sarkozy and Mr Herzog were using secret phone lines and that the two had discussed ways to obtain confidential information about another case involving the former president, that of major appeals France’s court was edited.
Prosecutors say Mr Sarkozy tried to illegally obtain information from Mr Azibert, then a court judge, including promising to use his influence to secure a job for the Monaco judge.
The job never came off, but under French law, prosecutors don’t have to prove that a corrupt deal was carried out to get a conviction – only that was agreed. Mr. Herzog, 65, and Mr. Azibert also deny any wrongdoing.
Paul-Albert Iweins, one of Mr. Herzog’s lawyers, said the wiretapping of the conversations between Mr. Sarkozy and Mr. Herzog was a violation of lawyer-client confidentiality and that the conversations between Mr. Herzog and Mr. Azibert were mere conversations between Mr. Herzog’s friends.
“All of these are small sentences that have been taken out of context,” Iweins told Franceinfo Radio on Monday.
Mr Sarkozy is due to stand trial next year on another case involving his 2012 campaign, in which he was accused of exceeding strict campaign spending limits. Other cases against Mr Sarkozy have closed, including one accusing us of manipulating the heiress of L’Oréal’s cosmetics fortune to fund his 2007 campaign.
Despite his legal troubles, Mr Sarkozy remains on good terms with President Emmanuel Macron, who recently reflected his tough stance on issues such as crime and immigration and even made Gérald Darmanin, a former protégé of Mr Sarkozy, his home secretary.
And while Mr Sarkozy denies he has any new political ambitions – “Politics is no longer my concern today,” he told BFM TV this month – he still has a significant influence on the French with the firm support of his political party Les Républicains Rights and an unprecedented ability to electrify its base.
Last summer, Mr Sarkozy’s latest book, reflecting the early years of his presidency, was a bestseller and he is regularly searched for autographs and selfies as he signs books.
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