Carla Bruni looked far from her usual glamorous self while supporting her husband Nicholas Sarkozy, in court.
The French model wore minimal makeup, a simple black suit, and a pair of stained white trainers as she was photographed walking through the Palais de Justice courthouse in Paris this morning.
Her husband, France’s ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy, had attended an appeals trial where he claimed he was ‘innocent’, rejecting charges he had sought Libyan financing for his 2007 election in exchange for helping improve Tripoli’s image after deadly bombings.
Bruni, 58, also made an appearance at the courthouse in support of her husband, as she was seen flanked by two security guards while holding only her sunglasses and mobile phone.
The former first lady of France bore a defeated expression as her lightly wavy hair draped around her face. She stared straight ahead and refrained from smiling.
It was a far cry from how the glamorous French singer stepped out into the streets of Paris on October 21, the day of Sarkozy’s incarceration at La Sante prison.
Donning a chic black turtleneck jumper and a fitted grey suit, Bruni had painted on a dark lip and bronzed her cheeks – a sophisticated look the French singer is known to wear in public.
The case saw Sarkozy, 71, who has always denied any wrongdoing, become modern France’s first president to have gone to jail.
The French model wore minimal makeup, a simple black suit, and a pair of stained white trainers as she was photographed walking through the Palais de Justice courthouse in Paris
Bruni, 58, made an appearance at the courthouse in support of her husband, as she was seen flanked by two security guards while holding only her sunglasses and mobile phone
The former first lady of France bore a defeated expression as her lightly wavy hair draped around her face
Carla Bruni-Sarkozy (C), wife of France’s former president Nicolas Sarkozy, returns to the courtroom during the appeal trial of her husband over charges he sought Libyan financing for his 2007 election
He served 20 days before he was released pending the appeal.
In the initial trial, prosecutors had argued Sarkozy’s aides, acting in his name, struck a deal with Gaddafi, promising in return to help restore the Libyan leader’s international image after Tripoli was blamed for two airplane bombings.
The West laid the blame on Libya for the bombing of the Pan Am Flight 103 in 1988 over Lockerbie in Scotland, which killed 259 people, and of the UTA Flight 772 over Niger the following year, which took the lives of 170 people.
Relatives of those killed in the 1989 spoke of their ordeal at the appeal trial last week.
‘You can only respond to such indescribable suffering with truth,’ Sarkozy said on the first of several days of taking the stand, with Bruni, in the courtroom.
‘But you cannot repair suffering with an injustice: I am innocent,’ he said.
Read More
Sarkozy’s prison hell: Disgraced former French president to publish memoir about spell in jail
The lower court found Sarkozy guilty of criminal conspiracy over what it said was a scheme to acquire Libyan funding, but not of receiving or using the funds for the campaign.
The appeal trial is set to run until June 3, with a verdict expected in the fall. If convicted, Sarkozy faces up to 10 years in prison.
In December, Sarkozy released a tell-all memoir, in which he described the grim reality of life in jail – from the ‘absence of colour’ to his bleak diet.
Speaking to French newspaper Le Figaro after walking free, the former conservative leader detailed the personal torment he endured after being handed the five-year prison sentence in October.
Sarkozy painted a grim portrait of confinement, writing: ‘I was struck by the absence of any colour. Grey dominated everything, devoured everything, covered all surfaces’.
He explained he wrote the book by hand at a small plywood table in a 12-square-metre cell, adding: ‘In prison, there is nothing to see and nothing to do,’ before continuing: ‘The noise is unfortunately constant. But, as in the desert, the interior life is strengthened in prison.’
Nicolas Sarkozy kisses his wife Carla Bruni-Sarkozy before leaving in a car on the day of his incarceration at La Sante prison on October 21, 2025
Former French president Nicolas Sarkozy and his wife, Carla Bruni, leave his residence to report for prison on October 21, 2025
Nicolas Sarkozy became the first French head of state to be jailed since the end of the Second World War, spending three weeks locked inside the walls of Paris’s La Sante prison (pictured)
Most inmates share their cells, but Sarkozy was housed in solitary confinement for his safety and to prevent any violent incident
He was held in an isolation wing for his own protection, with his cell door kept shut for long periods, armed officers guarded him around the clock, and even slept in a cell next door.
Sarkozy’s dramatic early release on November 10 came after a court hearing where his lawyers argued that defendants awaiting appeal are typically not kept behind bars unless deemed dangerous or at risk of absconding or interfering with evidence.
During the hearing, Sarkozy described his jail term in video testimony as a ‘nightmare’ and again insisted he was innocent.
Read More
Nicolas Sarkozy is seen dining at Parisian restaurant with wife a day after his release from jail
He has faced a series of legal issues since leaving office and has already received two definitive convictions in other cases.
France’s highest court upheld a separate conviction for breaking campaign spending limits during his failed 2012 re-election bid, for which he received six months of house arrest after spending €42.8 million – almost double the legal cap.
He also faces the possibility of another trial linked to alleged pressure placed on witness Ziad Takieddine, who claimed he delivered suitcases of cash from Libya to the French ministry before later withdrawing the claim.
The last time France jailed a former head of state was Philippe Petain, the wartime Vichy leader, who was sentenced to death in 1945 before his punishment was commuted to life imprisonment.
But the Sarkozy case remains deeply diverse. Many right-wing voters believe he was hounded by politically motivated prosecutors, while his critics – and around 60 per cent of the general public – supported the sentence.
