French Supreme Court confirms Sarkozy's conviction for illicit financing in 2012 campaign
The former French president must therefore serve his now final sentence of one year in prison, including six months without parole. This is the second definitive criminal conviction after the Bismuth wiretapping dossier
The French Court of Cassation has rejected the appeal filed by former President Nicolas Sarkozy in the Bygmalion casefor which he was sentenced on 14 February 2024 by the Paris Court of Appeal to one year's imprisonment, including six months' mandatory imprisonment, for illegally financing his 2012 presidential campaign. This is the second final criminal conviction for the former president after the Bismuth dossier on wiretapping.
In its ruling, the Court of Cassation explained 'that the unlawful financing of an election campaign has been established'. "In fact, the candidate personally gave consent to his staff to incur campaign expenses on his behalf, despite knowing that such expenses would result in exceeding the limit set by law," the ruling added. This was reported by broadcaster Bfmtv.
Investigations revealed that, in order to disguise the exaggerated expenses of his election campaign (almost EUR 43 million compared to the legally permitted maximum amount of EUR 22.5 million), a system of double invoicing had been put in place, attributing a large part of the cost of meetings to the Union for the Popular Movement (UMP) party, later to become LR, under cover of fictitious agreements with the event company Bygmalion.
