A court in Paris has found Nicolas Sarkozy guilty of illegal campaign funding and sentenced him to one year in prison. The Paris court ruled Thursday that the sentence would take the form of electronically monitored house arrest. Sarkozy announced that he would appeal the verdict.
This is the second time that the former French president has been convicted. The Paris Criminal Chamber justified its judgment with the fact that Sarkozy ignored warnings from the responsible accountants and exceeded the spending limits set in France for presidential election campaigns. The prosecutor had previously requested a six-month prison sentence. The defense had pleaded for acquittal.
In France, campaign spending is capped by law to ensure equal opportunities between candidates. In 2012, when Sarkozy applied for a second term of office after five years of presidency, the maximum permitted limit was 22.5 million euros; in fact, Sarkozy’s team is said to have spent at least 42.8 million.
In order to cover up this overspending, expenses are said to have been camouflaged by a system of fictitious invoices from Sarkozy’s UMP party – which has since been renamed Republicans. Sarkozy allegedly failed to create the system of fictitious invoices, but ignored two warnings from accountants. In addition to Sarkozy, 13 people are on trial on suspicion of fraud and aiding and abetting. Jérôme Lavrilleux, who was once Vice-President of the Election Campaign, is one of them.
Sarkozy had personally denied the allegations in court. Despite the large campaign budget, the conservative lost the election to his socialist challenger François Hollande.
The French judiciary is also investigating Sarkozy for alleged payments from Libya for his election campaign in 2007. In another affair, he was sentenced in March to three years in prison, two of which were suspended, for bribery and illicit influence. He has announced that he will appeal. No president of the Fifth Republic of France, which has existed since 1958, has so far been punished so severely. “Sarko”, as he is often called in the country, has turned his back on politics, but is still considered very influential in the background.