Paris
—
20 days, 213 pages.
Nicolas Sarkozy wrote more than 10 pages for each 24-hour period he spent in prison in a new book detailing his time at La Santé prison in Paris.
“If I had ignored the armored door with eye holes, it might have been a cheap hotel,” the former French president recalled in a book released Wednesday, a month after his Nov. 10 release from prison.
Sarkozy wrote in “The Prisoner’s Diary” that prison was “hell”, a book that comes amid intense public attention and scrutiny over his September conviction on charges of conspiracy to finance his 2007 election campaign with money from Libya.
He was released early from his five-year sentence in November, pending an appeal.
The view outside the window was blocked by plastic panels, Sarkozy said of his time in prison, adding that it was impossible to see the sky or even know the weather. At night, he wrote, he was haunted by the jeers of his fellow prisoners that echoed through the prison. One night, he was awakened by prisoners setting fire to a nearby cell.
It was a far cry from the luxuries he enjoyed as France’s head of state from 2007 to 2012.
“Sitting on the unmade bed, I was in shock. Even during my military service, I had never felt a mattress so hard. If it had been a table, it would have been almost soft,” he wrote. Still, like other prisoners in the so-called VIP wing, which consists of 18 cells, he enjoyed a private television, shower, refrigerator and cooking stove.
The book chronicles his daily life in prison, interspersed with reflections on the weeks between his sentencing and his arrival at the gates of La Santé on October 21st.
In France, the public audience given to Sarkozy after his conviction was a hot topic.
He was invited to the presidential palace, but Sarkozy said that as a result of their meeting, French President Emmanuel Macron agreed to transfer him to another prison, insisting that he be housed in “an apartment for families of prisoners.” Sarkozy said he rejected the offer.
He was also met in prison by his former colleague and current Minister of Justice, Gerald Darmanin, sparking outrage from many in France. Messages and calls for support have also been received from world leaders and ambassadors, the book said.
Sarkozy said Charles Kushner, the father of Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, also requested to meet Sarkozy for the first time in prison. Kushner was later pardoned by President Trump, but served time in prison for tax evasion, retaliating against a federal witness and lying to the Federal Election Commission.
The reality of Sarkozy’s life in prison, where he meets his family at least once every two days, is a far cry from how he describes the lives of inmates in the prison’s so-called VIP and isolation wings. “No one sees them. No one sees them,” he writes.
For Sarkozy, the book is an attempt to detoxify his image.
Gone are the past debates demanding harsh justice. The law and order president said in 2012 that “French courts must punish high-ranking thugs because they are even worse in the case of thugs than lower-ranking thugs.”
Instead, a rosy account of his life after his conviction is published.
He detailed how, just days before heading to prison, he took a teenage cancer patient to a soccer game and received applause at a restaurant. He says soccer fans showered him with support and recalls families lining the street as he was escorted to prison, the same crowd that cheered him on election night.
Prison officials were overwhelmed with his fan mail, including 20 Bibles, 30 of the same award-winning novels, and hundreds of letters a day — “more than I’ve ever received as president,” he wrote.
For those wondering if this is an over-dramatization of his time as a prisoner, the book’s first line warns: “This is not a novel.”
Determined to maintain his innocence, Sarkozy devotes half a chapter to condemning the journalistic investigation that led to his eventual conviction.
In November, France’s Supreme Court upheld his conviction in a separate case related to illegal financing of his 2012 re-election campaign. He is one of the few modern political leaders to have seen the inside of a prison as an inmate.
Incredibly, he compares himself to Alfred Dreyfus, a former prisoner of La Santé and a prominent figure of unjust persecution in France. France, the victim of vicious anti-Semitism, later sought to undo the charges imposed on Dreyfus.
The prison chaplain’s visits every Sunday mark a milestone in Sarkozy’s 20 days in prison. And the former president has publicly stated that he rekindled his faith after being encouraged by the biography of Jesus Christ he brought into his cell. He also brought two volumes of the legendary prison escapee, The Count of Monte Cristo.
The right-wing politician undoubtedly seems touched by his imprisonment. The pain of being separated from their families becomes clear when they see the caring staff and the monotonous reality of spending time in prison. So too is his newfound appreciation for all he has lost: “In La Santé, I started my life over again,” he concludes the book.
But on page 213 there is little empathy for his fellow prisoners. He is putting himself on the line, he argues, both literally as a man who is isolated from other prisoners and treated with some degree of respect by staff, and figuratively as an innocent living the “unthinkable.”
“I entered[prison]as a head of state, but I left with the same rank,” Sarkozy writes on the last page of his book, recalling the throngs of police, media and supporters who surrounded him during his time in prison.
The reality of Mr. Sarkozy’s imprisonment is a little more grim. He entered the country as a prisoner. He left with the same ranking.
Additional reporting by Philippe Cordier.
