Three prison inmates have been arrested following “threats to kill” former French president Nicolas Sarkozy. The men, who have not been named, are fellow prisoners of the 70-year-old in La Santé, a jail in Paris.
Police swooped into their cells following the appearance of a video on social media in which the former head of state was subjected to disturbing threats. On Thursday, a spokesman for Paris prosecutors said: “Three inmates at the Santé prison were taken into custody following threats being made upon the arrival of Nicolas Sarkozy. An administrative search was carried out of their cells by the prison administration, during which two phones were seized.” The spokesman said a formal investigation had been opened into “death threats”.
Two police officers have now moved into the cell next door to Mr Sarkozy to look after him.
The former head of state was incarcerated on Tuesday, following a five-year sentence for conspiring to accept laundered cash from the late Libyan dictator, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi.
Within hours, a video appeared online in which a fellow inmate reportedly shouts: “We know everything, Sarko… we know everything. Give back the billions of dollars”.
Interior Minister Laurent Nuñez ordered two officers from the VIP Protection Service, the SDLP, to occupy the “cell next door to the former president’s for 24 hours a day”.
Among those who shared one of the videos was National Rally politician, Marine Le Pen.
She wrote: “I have no doubt that some must be delighted by this situation. But I want to believe that millions of French people feel, like me, disgust”.
Carla Bruni, Mr Sarkozy’s third wife, has already visited him in prison after lawyers confirmed that his nights there were “frightening.”
He is currently serving a five-year term but has also been convicted of two earlier offences and faces further criminal enquiries. Mr Sarkozy is now the first French head of state to go to a prison cell since Marshall Philippe Pétain, the wartime Nazi collaborator.
Mr Sarkozy now spends most of his time alone in a 29-square-foot cell equipped with a shower, bed, small desk, landline phone, and TV, which will cost him the equivalent of £13 a month to watch.