As a former president of France, Nicolas Sarkozy has been behind many doors closed to the average French citizen.
On October 21, as the cold steel of his jail cell door clangs behind him, he’ll be in one room to which few would covet entry.
The former French leader was convicted in September of criminal conspiracy in awhat the court heard was a scheme to finance his 2007 presidential campaign with funds from Libya in exchange for diplomatic favors. He was sentenced to five years in prison but is likely to be released on parole partway through.
The former president intends to appeal, but in the meantime is expected to occupy a cell either in solitary confinement or in the so-called “VIP wing” of La Santé prison complex in Paris, the only prison in the French capital.
That wing is reserved for prisoners considered unsuited to be among the prison’s general population, usually out of fears for their own safety. They could be politicians, former police officers, members of far-right organizations or those tied to Islamist terror groups, CNN affiliate BFMTV reported.
It is thought that Sarkozy will be housed in the so-called VIP wing of La Santé prison, or in solitary confinement. – Bertrand Guay/AFP/Getty Images
Sitting opposite an old people’s home in a residential corner of Paris’ 14th arrondissement, La Santé’s unassuming presence is only given away by the occasional wailing siren as prisoners are transported to and from the site.
In winter months, the faces of inmates can sometimes be seen peering out from behind the barred windows of the prison through the bare branches of the tree-lined avenue. Occasionally their stares are returned by a package lobbed over the walls by a passerby, as CNN witnessed.
Notorious past prisoners
Over the past century and a half, the walls of La Santé have deprived many famous French men of their freedom.
One of the world’s most wanted terrorists of the 1970s and 1980s, Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, aka “Carlos the Jackal,” spent time in La Santé, as did Jacques Mesrine, a notorious murderer and bank robber of the 1970s whose criminal career was portrayed in a 2008 film starring Vincent Cassel. Mesrine famously also broke out from La Santé’s walls.
Other well-known inmates include Alfred Dreyfus, the Jewish army captain at the center of the late 19th-century Dreyfus Affair, in which antisemitism saw him wrongly convicted of treason, and more recently Alexandre Benalla, an aide and former bodyguard of Emmanuel Macron sentenced to jail time after he was filmed beating Yellow Vest protesters.
Sarkozy won’t even be the prison’s first world leader. Manuel Noriega, the former dictator of Panama, spent time there following his extradition from the United States after the American invasion that deposed him.
Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, known as “Carlos the Jackal,” spent years in La Santé after he was given a life sentence in 1997. – Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images
Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega at a ceremony commemorating the death of Panama’s national hero Omar Torrijo in Panama City. – William Gentile/Corbis/Getty Images
Unsurprisingly, Sarkozy isn’t happy about heading to prison.
“If they absolutely want me to sleep in prison, I will sleep in prison. But with my head held high. I am innocent,” he said after his sentencing hearing, his voice boiling with anger.
“This injustice is a scandal,” he continued, with his wife, the singer and model Carla Bruni-Sarkozy, at his side.
She’s likely to be one of the first former supermodels to enter the prison if she pays him a visit.
The former French leader was supported in court by his wife, the singer and model Carla Bruni-Sarkozy. – Lafargue Raphael/ABACA/Shutterstock
‘The problem is the noise’
But behind its high brick walls, La Santé is no dungeon.
“It’s alright, La Santé, it’s like an Ibis Hotel,” Marco Mouly, a former prisoner in the prison’s VIP wing told BFMTV in a 2022 documentary, referring to a popular European budget hotel chain.
Built in 1867, with a distinctive radial layout designed to give prisoners the feeling of being under constant surveillance, the prison recently underwent a four-year renovation and modernization program, reopening in 2019.
In the winter months, faces of prisoners can be seen peering out from behind the barred windows of La Santé prison. – Michel Euler/AP
If Sarkozy is housed in the VIP wing, one of 18 identical cells will be allotted to him, each of which boasts a cooking hob, fridge, television, shower and toilet, as well as a fixed telephone line allowing prisoners to call certain authorized numbers.
The cells measure nine square meters (nearly 97 square foot), no bigger than normal cells, although residents in this special wing aren’t required to share a cell, typically out of concern for their safety.
Still, a stay is far from comfortable, those who’ve experienced it say.
“The problem is the noise,” Didier Schuller, a former civil servant and politician held for several weeks in La Santé told BFMTV in 2022. “At night, you’re woken up by people shouting.”
A former policeman interviewed by the broadcaster described the insults shouted non-stop by prisoners on other wings when they learned he had arrived as an inmate.
There’s little chance that Sarkozy won’t attract similar attention behind bars. And despite his vow to appeal his conviction, his liberty may seem a long way off on that first night locked up.
“You know when you’re going in,” Patrick Balkany, former mayor of Levallois-Peret, northwest of Paris, told BFMTV of La Santé, where he served several months for tax evasion before being released on health grounds. “You don’t know when you’re coming out.”
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