France: the former Minister of the Interior Claude Guéant imprisoned in the prison of Health

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Claude Guéant was imprisoned on Monday morning, pursuant to his conviction in 2017 in the case of cash bonuses from the Ministry of the Interior, his lawyer, Philippe Bouchez El Ghozi, told AFP.

A former senior state clerk behind bars: the former Minister of the Interior Claude Guéant was imprisoned on Monday, December 13, in the morning, in the prison of Health. This imprisonment follows his conviction in 2017 in the case of cash bonuses from the Ministry of the Interior, his lawyer Philippe Bouchez El Ghozi told AFP. This information confirms that given earlier by the LCI news channel.

The former right-hand man of Nicolas Sarkozy, 76, was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment, including one year and a fine of 75,000 euros on appeal in January 2017. Since then, he had been serving this sentence under the regime of the conditional liberty. But the Paris Court of Appeal chose to revoke part of his suspension and his parole, considering that the former secretary general of the Élysée Palace did not make the necessary payments to pay the fine and damages. that he had been inflicted.

“In execution of two judgments delivered on November 9, the person presented himself today to the service for the execution of sentences of the Paris prosecutor’s office and was imprisoned at the Paris-La-Santé penitentiary center”, writes Monday the general prosecutor’s office in a press release.

The ex-right-hand man of Nicolas Sarkozy has been placed in jail for nine months, told AFP Me Philippe Bouchez El-Ghozi, who announced his intention to seize the judge responsible for the execution of sentences to obtain an adjustment, stressing the “worrying” state of health of his client.

“He pays what he can pay, that is to say 3,000 euros per month, he has no hidden money so he cannot pay more, and despite that, we have decided that we would send him to prison, ”he lamented.

Court decisions not respected

These decisions of the Court of Appeal had led to a reopening, extremely rare, of the debates in the case of the polls of the Elysee, for which the former secretary general of the Elysee appeared in October and November at the Paris court. alongside four former relatives of Nicolas Sarkozy.

During a hearing on December 3, Claude Guéant repeated: “I have done all I can and I am doing all I can to pay off my debt”.

The representative of the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF), on the contrary, estimated that the former minister did not “respect court decisions”, increasing his requisitions against him, from one year of imprisonment including six months closed, to one year of firm imprisonment.

The financial prosecutor had argued that “only 36%” of its debt of approximately 190,000 euros to the public treasury has been discharged and this, for “a large part, in a forced way through foreclosures”.

The decision in the polls case is expected on January 21.

With AFP