A first for a President of the Fifth Republic.

The former head of state Nicolas Sarkozy was sentenced, Monday, March 1, in Paris, to three years' imprisonment, including one firm, for corruption and influence peddling in the so-called "eavesdropping" affair, born in 2014 of telephone interceptions with his lawyer Thierry Herzog. 

The criminal court considered that a "corruption pact" had been concluded between the former president, now 66 years old, Me Thierry Herzog and the former high magistrate Gilbert Azibert, also sentenced to three years in prison, including a farm.

Thierry Herzog has also received a ban on practicing the profession of lawyer for five years.

The prosecution was based in particular on telephone exchanges between the former head of state and his lawyer, Thierry Herzog, through a telephone line registered in the name of Paul Bismuth.

"Devastating effects"

On December 8, the National Financial Prosecutor's Office (PNF) had demanded against Nicolas Sarkozy four years' imprisonment, two of which were firm, believing that the presidential image had been "damaged" by this affair with "devastating effects". 

Nicolas Sarkozy was accused of having attempted to obtain in 2014, through Me Herzog, secret information from Gilbert Azibert, then a senior magistrate, in a procedure concerning the seizure of his diaries on the sidelines of the Bettencourt affair .

Information that had to be delivered by the magistrate in exchange for a boost for a prestigious position in Monaco. 

Before the court, his lawyers had argued that in the end, Nicolas Sarkozy had not been successful before the Court of Cassation and that Gilbert Azibert had never had a post in Monaco.

According to the law, however, it is not necessary for the consideration to have been obtained, nor for the influence to be real, to characterize the offenses of corruption and influence peddling.

Nicolas Sarkozy will appear in court again on March 17, this time in the Bygmalion affair, for suspicion of illegal financing of his campaign in 2012.

With AFP and Reuters

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