The former French president has asserted that his period of incarceration has been “exhausting” and an “ordeal” as he was present via video link at a judicial proceeding regarding his application to serve his sentence at home.
Sarkozy, wearing a navy blue suit, appeared on camera from prison on Monday, positioned at a desk with his lawyers beside him. He told the court: “I want to acknowledge all the correctional officers, who are exceptionally humane, and who have made this nightmare bearable – because it is a horrific experience.”
Sarkozy was admitted to La Santé prison in Paris on 21 October, after being handed a half-decade imprisonment for illegal collaboration over a scheme to secure financing for his 2007 presidential election campaign from the government of the late Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi.
He has appealed against the ruling, but the court ruled that because of the “exceptional gravity” of his conviction, he had to go to prison while the appeals process proceeded.
The former leader, who served as France’s conservative leader between 2007 and 2012, is the first former head of an EU country to serve time in prison, and the initial leader since WWII to be incarcerated.
Sarkozy told the court from prison: “I was completely unaware or desire to ask Mr Gaddafi for any kind of financing … I will never confess to something I am innocent of … I could not have foreseen that at this stage of life, I’d be in prison. It’s an challenge that has been imposed on me. I admit it’s hard, it’s extremely challenging. It has an impact on any prisoner because it’s exhausting.”
He said he would not try to communicate with any defendants or testifiers in the case. He said: “I’m French, I am patriotic, my family is in France. This ordeal has caused them pain a lot.”
Sarkozy’s lawyer Jean-Michel Darrois, sitting next to him in the prison video link room, stated: “Being in isolation has been very hard for him.” He commented on Sarkozy: “He’s a strong, durable and brave man and this imprisonment has caused him great suffering.”
In court, a different legal representative, Christophe Ingrain, who had visited him every day, asserted Sarkozy would be more secure outside jail than within. “He has faced death threats, has listened to shouts at night and the emergency response in a adjacent room when a prisoner self-harmed,” he stated.
The public attorney Damien Brunet asked that Sarkozy’s request for release be granted. The court will announce its decision on Monday afternoon.
Sarkozy has been held in solitary confinement for his own safety, in an individual cell of about 9 sq metres, with his own washing facility and restroom. Security personnel are stationed nearby to protect him.
Reports indicated that he had been consuming solely yogurt in prison as he feared any meal might have been tampered with. He had been given the opportunity to cook for himself but refused this.
His online presence last week posted a recording of piles of letters, postcards and packages it claimed had been delivered to his attention, including a collage, a chocolate bar and a book. “No correspondence will go unanswered,” his account announced. “The final chapter has not yet been written.”
The former leader brought with him a life story of Christ as well as the classic novel, the famous work in which an innocent man is imprisoned but escapes to seek retribution.
During the lengthy court case, the public prosecutor had informed the judges that Sarkozy entered into a “Faustian pact of corruption with one of the worst rulers of the last 30 years.
Sarkozy maintained his innocence and said he had not been involved in a criminal conspiracy to seek election funding from Libya.
He was found not guilty of three distinct accusations of dishonesty, misuse of Libyan public funds and illegal election campaign funding. After the public attorney also challenged these acquittals, Sarkozy will be re-tried on all the accusations next year, including criminal conspiracy.
Although the allegations of a clandestine financial agreement with the Libyan regime formed the biggest corruption trial Sarkozy had faced, he had already been found guilty in two separate cases and stripped of France’s highest distinction, the Légion d’honneur.
Sarkozy had previously become the initial ex-leader forced to wear an electronic tag after being found guilty in a separate case of dishonesty and influence peddling. In that case, he was given a 12-month sentence but was able to complete it with an electronic tag attached to his leg. He had the device for a quarter year before being granted conditional release.
