FORMER French president Nicolas Sarkozy shall be held in solitary confinement at a Parisian jail famend for beheadings, escapes and riots.
Sarkozy was jailed for 5 years after being discovered responsible of a “felony conspiracy” plot to launder hundreds of thousands of {dollars} of money from ruthless Libyan dictator Colonel Gaddafi.
The previous politician is about to be seconded to La Santé Jail the place he’ll stay in solitary confinement at some point of his sentence.
La Santé has stood since 1867 and boasts a grim previous, the jail was the location of a lot of guillotine beheadings, three excessive profile escapes and dozens of violent riots.
It additionally performs host to a wing termed the “particular space” the place convicted excessive profile figures like Sarkozy are held.
All through his time within the infamous jail Sarkozy shall be held individually from different inmates and can at all times be accompanied by a guard for his personal security.
His cell will function a mattress, desk, bathe, rest room and sizzling plate and he can even apply to have a fridge and TV put in within the area which he’ll solely be allowed to depart for train.
Sarkozy will be part of a protracted listing of dozens of notorious criminals held within the looming jail, which sits subsequent to a faculty within the 14th arrondissement of Paris.
He’ll be part of the ranks of former inmates together with the likes of Manuel Noriega, Carlos the Jackal and Parisian gangster Jaques Mesrine, who all did stints behind the prisons bars.
Famously, in 1978 Jaques Mesrine made a daring escape from La Santé, scaling the looming partitions and disappearing into the streets of Paris.
The jail has gained a lot notoriety over time that it was dubbed a “a web site of reminiscence” by the general public relations arm of the French jail service.
However regardless of the considerably revered standing achieved by La Santé the jail’s historical past has been riddled with blights.
In 2000 a ebook was printed, penned by the jail’s former chief medical officer, exposing the squalid life led by prisoners caged in La Santé.
The inform all described a vile infestation of cockroaches and rats and defined how prisoners have been piled on prime of each other within the grim overcrowded jailhouse.
In line with the novel, suicidal prisoners have been sure in chains and inmates suffered the form of wounds often solely seen in wartime.
Trench foot, and different pores and skin infections have been rife and the jail’s group of caged criminals developed a form of twisted algorithm and morality.
La Santé, it was claimed, was ruled by violence and illogic with the authorities abandoning the place to rot.
Management has traditionally been exercised by way of violence on the jail with its sordid historical past seeing dozens of prisoners executed by guillotine, some as lately as 1972.
Roger Bontems and Claude Buffet met their ends within the courtyard of La Santé and have become the final two males to be executed by guillotine on the infamous jail.
The pair publicly killed for his or her try to interrupt out of La Santé, an try that noticed a nurse and a guard taken as hostages and brutally killed.
One other, much less violent, breakout try was launched in 1986 when inmate Michel Vaujour fled the prisons partitions.
His daring escape try noticed his spouse fly a helicopter into the jail to select him up.
The dramatic escape made headlines and marked the final time a prisoner would discover their means out from inside La Santé.
Three of the jail’s worst blocks have been closed down within the wake of the scandalous revelations with the French authorities desperately making an attempt to show issues round.
The jail was opened for public as a part of a collection of heritage days each autumn which sees the federal government open up locations of historic significance which are usually hidden from the general public gaze.
The federal government has claimed that its fashions for reform in its prisons are second to none.
Sarkozy will serve his five-year sentence on the highest flooring of the prisons isolation wing.
Other than his cell the ex president will solely be allowed to make two visits a day to one of many jail’s gyms or train yards.
He shall be taken to La Santé on Tuesday together with his son, Louis, calling for a rally to be held the identical day in protest at his father’s sentence.
Louis wrote on Instagram: “This rally shouldn’t be political. That is neither a protest nor a denunciation.
” It’s merely a gesture of assist, a silent testimony worthy of a grateful nation in direction of a person who devoted his life to it.”
Judges sitting on the Paris Correctional Courtroom dominated that the money from the executed Libyan dictator Colonel Gaddafi helped Sarkozy, now 70, together with his electioneering.
It adopted a three-month trial that led to April, and which additionally concerned 11 different defendants, together with three of Sarkozy’s former ministers.
Sarkozy was sentenced to 5 years in jail – the utmost sentence doable for “felony conspiracy”.
He may even must pay a high quality of €100,000, whereas the date for the beginning of his jail time period is being set.
Choose Nathalie Gavarino dominated that Sarkozy was responsible of getting “allowed his shut associates to behave with a view to acquiring monetary assist from the Libyan regime.”
It’s the first time {that a} former French head of state has been discovered responsible of making an attempt to make use of international cash in such a way.
