Court convicts Sarkozy

Jail for French ex-prez

A Paris court on Monday found former French President Nicolas Sarkozy guilty of corruption and influence-peddling and sentenced him to one year in prison and a two-year suspended sentence.

Sarkozy, 66, who was president from 2007 to 2012, was convicted of trying to illegally obtain information from a senior magistrate in 2014 about a legal action in which he was involved.

The court said Sarkozy (pic- tured) may request home detainment with an electronic bracelet.

Sarkozy’s co-defendants — his lawyer, Thierry Herzog, 65, and now-retired magistrate Gilbert Azibert, 74 — were also found guilty and given the same sentence.

The court said the facts were “particularly serious” given that they were committed by a former president who used his status to help a magistrate who had served Sarkozy’s personal interest.

Sarkozy had firmly denied all the allegations against him during the 10-day trial late last year that focused on phone conversations in February 2014.

At that time, investigative judges had launched an inquiry into the financing of the 2007 presidential campaign. During the probe, they incidentally discovered that Sarkozy and Herzog were communicating via secret mobile phones registered to the alias “Paul Bismuth.”

Conversations wiretapped on these phones led prosecutors to suspect Sarkozy and Herzog of promising Azibert a job in Monaco in exchange for leaking information about another case involving France’s richest woman, L’Oreal heiress Liliane Bettencourt. In one of these phone calls with Herzog, Sarkozy said of Azibert: “I’ll make him move up . . . I’ll help him.”

Azibert never got the Monaco job, but prosecutors said the “clearly stated promise” constitutes a corruption offense, even if the promise wasn’t fulfilled.

Sarkozy vigorously denied any malicious intention.

Sarkozy will face another trial later this month along with 13 other people on charges of illegal financing of his 2012 presidential campaign.

And in still another investigation opened in 2013, he is accused of taking millions of euros from then-Libyan dictator Moammar Khadafy to illegally finance his 2007 campaign.