The former Minister of the Interior had made a request for accommodation a few days after his detention on December 13.
Two months after being imprisoned, the former Minister of the Interior Claude Guéant, 77, will be fixed Monday on his request for adjustment of sentence and will know if he can, or not, leave the prison of Health in Paris .
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First for a former tenant of Beauveau, Claude Guéant had been placed in detention on December 13, the justice having estimated that he did not settle in time the sums which he had been ordered to pay, in 2017, in the case of the cash bonuses of the Ministry of the Interior.
A few days after his imprisonment, the former right-hand man of Nicolas Sarkozy made a request for adjustment, examined on January 19 by a sentence enforcement judge, who put his decision under advisement on Monday. The judge can either refuse any accommodation or place the former senior state clerk on parole or on an electronic bracelet.
The one who was also prefect, director general of the national police and secretary general of the presidency was condemned on January 21 in his absence in another file, that of the polls of the Élysée. He was sentenced to one year’s imprisonment, including eight months for favoritism, with a deferred committal order. If he leaves prison, however, he will not return for this sentence: he has indeed appealed, which suspends the application of this sanction until a second trial.
A debt “fully paid»
Solicited by AFP, Claude Guéant’s lawyer did not wish to speak before Monday’s decision. In January, Me Philippe Bouchez El-Ghozi argued that his client had “fully paid” his debt on December 16 via loans granted by his relatives, and that in prison, his “health situation (could only) deteriorate, in view of the triple pathologyfrom which he suffers. The prosecution issued a favorable opinion on his requests.
At the origin of this incarceration: the conviction of Claude Guéant in January 2017, on appeal, in the case of cash bonuses from the Ministry of the Interior, for complicity in embezzlement of public funds and concealment. He was then sentenced to two years’ imprisonment, including one year suspended probation, a fine of 75,000 euros and, jointly with four other defendants, the payment of 210,000 euros in damages to the State.
This sentence became final in 2019 after the rejection of his cassation appeal. Since then, he has been serving the firm part of the sentence under the parole system, granted on the condition that he settle, little by little, the sums due.
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