A Paris court on Monday found former French President Nicolas Sarkozy guilty of corruption and influence peddling, sentencing him to one year in prison and a two-year suspended sentence.
Sarkozy, who served as president from 2007 to 2012, was convicted for attempting to illegally obtain confidential information from a senior magistrate in 2014 concerning a legal case in which he was involved. The court granted Sarkozy the option of serving his sentence at home under electronic surveillance.
This marks the first time in France’s modern history that a former president has been convicted of corruption.
Sarkozy’s lawyer and close confidant, Thierry Herzog, 65, and retired magistrate Gilbert Azibert, 74, were also convicted and received the same sentence. The court concluded that Sarkozy and his co-defendants had forged a “pact of corruption,” supported by “consistent and serious evidence.”The court described the crimes as “particularly serious,” highlighting that Sarkozy, as a former president and trained lawyer, knowingly leveraged his status to commit illegal acts for personal gain. His actions, it said, undermined public trust in the judicial system.
During the 10-day trial late last year, Sarkozy vigorously denied the accusations.
The case centered on intercepted phone calls in February 2014, where Sarkozy and Herzog were caught discussing efforts to secure privileged legal information from Azibert in exchange for offering him a prestigious role in Monaco.
* PBS contributed to this article.
