{"id":54501,"date":"2021-03-01T15:42:24","date_gmt":"2021-03-01T19:42:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=54501"},"modified":"2021-03-01T15:42:24","modified_gmt":"2021-03-01T19:42:24","slug":"sarkozy-shock-sentenced-to-3-years-after-loreal-heiress-scandal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=54501","title":{"rendered":"Sarkozy Shock: Sentenced to 3 Years After L’Oreal Heiress Scandal"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy Sentenced To Prison In Humiliating Corruption Conviction<\/h1>\n

ZeroHedge.com<\/p>\n

A Paris court has found former French President Nicolas Sarkozy guilty of corruption – which is only the second time in modern history that a French head of state has gone down on such a charge – for which he’s been issued\u00a0a sentence of three years in prison<\/strong>, two of which have been suspended.<\/p>\n

Despite the\u00a0prison sentence it’s expected however that the 66-year old\u00a0will\u00a0serve the non-suspended one year\u00a0portion on probation<\/strong>\u00a0– with an electronic bracelet and subject to a curfew.<\/p>\n

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Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy arriving in court, Getty Images<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Presiding Judge Christine M\u00e9e described in the ruling that the\u00a0“particularly serious”\u00a0<\/strong>crimes involving France’s leader who was in office 2007-2012 centered on him “using his status” as president to peddle influence for personal gain while\u00a0violating\u00a0state secrecy.<\/p>\n

Sarkozy “knew what [he] was doing was wrong”, the judge wrote, adding that his actions and those of a public magistrate and personal lawyer – both which were also found guilty of aiding in the scheme – had given the public “a very bad image of justice”.<\/p>\n

As BBC described the former president had been “found guilty of trying to bribe a magistrate by offering a prestigious job in Monaco in return for information about a criminal inquiry into his political party.”<\/p>\n

The key evidence came from tapped phone calls\u00a0going back to 2014<\/a>:<\/p>\n

The case centered on conversations between Azibert and Herzog, which were taped by investigators looking into claims that\u00a0Sarkozy accepted illicit payments from the L’Oreal heiress Liliane Bettencourt for his 2007 presidential campaign<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

The phone line they tapped was a secret number set up in a fictional name<\/strong>, Paul Bismuth, through which Sarkozy communicated with his lawyer.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n