Former French President Nicolas Sarkozy begins his jail term after being convicted for criminal conspiracy surrounding accepting money from the late Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.
Before being driven away, he held hands with his wife, the Italian actress and singer Carla Bruni Sarkozy, outside their Paris home.
As he was driven to jail, Sarkozy told the gathering crowd, “I have no doubt truth will prevail. But how crushing the price will have been. With unwavering strength, I tell the French people it is not a former president they are locking up this morning—it’s an innocent man. Do not feel sorry for me because my wife and my children are by my side…but this morning I feel deep sorrow for a France humiliated by a will for revenge.”
Sarkozy, now 70, was sent to the 19th-century prison, La Sante in the Montparnasse district, south of the River Seine.
There is a lot of sympathy for Sarkozy from the French people, who are incredulous that a former French president has been sent to jail. Sarkozy’s left-leaning political enemies maintain that he should be punished for his association with Gaddafi and for how he funded political campaigns.
The former French president protests his innocence, and his lawyer, Christophe Ingrain, will be appealing and is requesting that Sarkozy be released.
For his protection, Sarkozy will be kept in isolation and will spend most of his days in a 9-11 square metre cell which has a desk, an electric hob, a shower, a toilet, and a small TV. He will be in solitary confinement.
Sarkozy said he will now give his life to Jesus and took two books to prison with him, “A Life of Jesus” by Jean-Christian Petitfils and “The Count of Monte Cristo” by Alexandre Dumas.
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