Overview

• Nicolas Sarkozy was convicted of association de malfaiteurs and acquitted of corruption and illegal campaign financing, receiving a €100,000 fine and five years of ineligibility.
• Judges issued a mandat de dépôt à effet différé with exécution provisoire, and the financial prosecutor has summoned him on 13 October to notify the date and place of incarceration.
• The judgment says he let close aides Claude Guéant and Brice Hortefeux seek Libyan funding through contacts with Abdallah Senoussi, describing the conduct as of “exceptional gravity.”
• The court cited diaries and money movements indicating Libyan transfers but said it could not prove funds reached the 2007 campaign, which was not necessary to establish the criminal association.
• Co-defendants included Guéant, sentenced to six years, and Hortefeux, sentenced to two years, while ex-treasurer Éric Woerth was acquitted as reactions across French politics and foreign media underscored the unprecedented jailing of a former president.