70-year-old Nicolas Sarkozy will begin serving prison sentences on October 21 after being convicted for backing the 2007 presidential run with money from Muammar Gaddafi's government. The erstwhile president of France will go to the celebrated La Santé prison in Paris, which in the past hosted celebrities and politicians.
A prison in the 14th territory of Paris was built in 1867 and until 1972 it executed death sentences on the guillotine. Among the celebrated prisoners were gangster Jacques Mesrine, Maurice Papon convicted of crimes against planet War II humanity, and Alfred Dreyfus, a French judaic officer wrongly accused of espionage at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Conditions of imprisonment
Sarkozy will be placed in the QB4 wing for those in request of peculiar care, as reported in the paper "Le Monde". It consists of 19 cells and has a separate walking area and access to the gym and library.
The erstwhile president will be surviving in a one-man cell of 9 square meters with a broken window. The area is equipped with a stove, refrigerator, shower and landline telephone with approved numbers.
Restrictions and privileges
According to French media, Sarkozy may have 2 45-minute visits per week and 2 walks per day. A defender will accompany him everywhere in the prison, but the position of a public figure will avoid complete individual searches.
"The objectives of the inmates in La Santé are no different. There will be no preferential conditions for Sarkozy" - said Hugo Vitra, a prison guard, quoted by BFMTV. In his opinion, the only difference may be to separate any public individuals from another prisoners.
Response and Perspectives
Patrick Balkany, erstwhile mayor of Levallois-Perret, who stayed in La Santé in 2019, advises the erstwhile president to cook himself. According to the interviewer Radio Sud, the prison kitchen is fatal, and the usage of the disc in the cell is "comfort" compared to the conditions of most French prisoners.
Sarkozy himself declared that "he will not request any facilities." "When you gotta lift a cross, you gotta carry it to the end. And this is not the end of the story," the erstwhile president said.
Appeal procedures
Sarkozy's lawyers plan to file an appeal immediately after he is seated, citing client age and "legal deficiencies", as reported by "Times". The justice of the appeal court will have 2 months to examine the application for release from prison and the possible consent to the execution of the conviction in the electronic surveillance system.
According to French media, the last imprisoned leader of the French state was Philippe Petain, head of Vicha's government collaborating with Germany, who died in 1951. Sarkozy, however, will not be the first European policy of this rank to go to prison - erstwhile Portuguese Prime Minister José Socrates spent almost a year in a prison in Évor in 2014 on charges of taxation offences and money laundering.
Sources used: "Le Monde", "BFMTV", "Radio Sud", "Times" Note: This article has been edited with the aid of Artificial Intelligence.
