Light filtered through shutters in the stiflingly hot courtroom, and the prison sentence hit the former foreign minister Roland Dumas like a physical blow. The 78-year-old lawyer sank onto the front row of the tribunal, then his silver-maned head jerked backwards. After regaining his composure, Dumas twirled his cane and stared at the ceiling.
Dumas, a statesman known for friendships with Picasso and Giacometti as well as Francois Mitterrand, a ladies' man famed for his elegance and powers of seduction, yesterday became a convicted criminal. He was sentenced to six months in prison, a two-year suspended sentence and a 1 million francs (£120,000 sterling) fine for receiving property embezzled from the French national oil company.
Since the trial of Dumas and six co-defendants ended in March, all France waited to see whether a man once considered untouchable would go to prison. Dumas's former mistress, a former lingerie model 25 years his junior named Christine Deviers-Joncour, received an even tougher sentence of 18 months in prison and a 1.5 million francs fine.
Deviers-Joncour has called herself "the whore of the Republic". She was convicted of receiving 65 million francs (£7.8 million) including "salary" for a fictitious job at the then state-owned oil company Elf, commissions for "lobbying" Dumas to accept an arms sale to Taiwan, a 17 million francs (£2.04 million) apartment near the Eiffel Tower and unlimited use of a company credit card.
Although she never had an office at Elf, Deviers-Joncour said during the trial that she was "proud to have done this work; it was good for Elf and good for France".
Three judges concluded that Deviers-Joncour was in fact "hired" by the former Elf chairman, Loik Le Floch-Prigent, and his deputy, Alfred Sirven, to thank Dumas for asking President Mitterrand to appoint Le Floch as chairman of the oil company. Le Floch says exorbitant commissions and phoney jobs for friends and relatives of politicians were common practice in France.
Le Floch was sentenced to 3 1/2 years in prison and fined 2 million francs. Sirven, whose arrest in the Philippines and dramatic repatriation to France provided some of the most colourful moments of the trial, received a four-year prison sentence and a 2 million francs fine. An estimated 3 billion francs (£360 million) disappeared from Elf coffers while Le Floch and Sirven ran the company, not all of which has been recovered.
Gilbert Miara, another Deviers-Joncour lover who helped her transfer embezzled funds to Switzerland and the Caribbean, received an 18month sentence and a 1 million francs fine. Two Elf executives who processed payments to Deviers-Joncour through company accounts were cleared.
The five defendants convicted of graft yesterday announced they will appeal, a process which could take up to two years.
Dumas's illustrious career looks set to end in prison and French politicians may now think twice about doing favours and receiving gifts.