Lawyers of former French president Nicolas Sarkozy have asked France's top court to get rid of evidence of obtained through wiretaps which exposed controversial phone conversations between Sarkozy and his lawyer. The movie is timely with expectations of a Sarkozy presidential bid under the conversation party for next year's elections.
According to Fox 7, the case in question is regarded as one of the most "potentially damaging" to Sarkozy's political future and could potentially affect his nomination for the 2017 French presidential race.
Nicolas Sarkozy is currently facing preliminary charges for committing corruption and influence peddling. The charges were backed with wiretapped evidence from 2013 to 2014. Sarkozy's lawyers strongly opposed the admission of the wiretaps as evidence to the case as it allegedly violated lawyer-client privilege.
Sarkozy's phones were first tapped as part of a probe over suspicions that he received illegal financing for his 2007 presidential campaign. Unfortunately for Sarkozy, the wiretaps shed light on a new, even bigger controversy that resulted in a separate legal case.
In the recordings which were taken in 2014, Nicolas Sarkozy can be heard speaking with his lawyer Thierry Herzog. The two can be heard discussing the idea of placing former high-ranking magistrate Gilbert Azibert in a top position in exchange for confidential information on a case that involved Sarkozy.
Sarkozy has denied any wrongdoing. Although he's been involved in legal cases since 2010, Sarkozy has never been indicted for a single charge, nor were his cases ever sent to trial.
During Thursday's hearing, Sarkozy's lawyer argued that the wiretapped evidence was obtain illegally and was used to divert from the original investigation to launch a new case against the former president.
Prosecutor Francois Cordier urged the court to rule in favor of the validity of all evidence obtain through the wiretap, ABC News reported.
Should the court rule the wiretapped material as illegal, this will advance Sarkozy into the election race in 2017.
Meanwhile, Nicolas Sarkozy has done other things to help his uphill struggle towards the 2017 French presidential race. According to Yahoo! News, he recently released a new book titled "France for Life" in which he accounts his failure to defeat Francois Hollande in the 2012 elections.
"Today, I regret delaying some reforms that should have been made in the first days of my presidency," Sarkozy wrote in his memoir.
The memoir is seen by many as an offering by Sarkozy to the French people in preparation for his presidential campaign.
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