- Reaction score
- 1,678
Jérôme Cahuzac, the minister who led François Hollande’s drive for a more honest tax system, has been sentenced to three years in prison for tax fraud and secretly stashing his wealth in tax havens around the world.
The deeply damaging saga, in which Cahuzac spearheaded the left’s crusade against tax avoidance while secretly hiding millions of euros of his own money from French tax authorities, was the biggest scandal to hit Hollande’s presidency.
Cahuzac was appointed Hollande’s tax tsar in 2012 to lead the Socialist president’s crusade against wealthy tax-avoiders and make the rich pay their share of dragging France out of its economic woes.
But in 2013 he was forced to admit he had hidden his own money in an account in Switzerland for 20 years and lied about it to parliament. The saga wrecked Hollande’s carefully crafted reputation as a straightforward “Mr Normal” who would oversee an honest government. It increased the public mistrust in France’s political class.
Cahuzac and his ex-wife, Patricia Ménard, who was also jailed, jointly ran a hair-transplant business treating some of France’s biggest celebrities. They were found guilty of tax fraud, tax evasion and laundering the proceeds. They hid millions of euros from the tax authorities for two decades, moving their money across the world from Switzerland to Singapore and the Isle of Man.
The prosecutor Jean-Marc Toublanc said during the trial this autumn that Cahuzac’s family life “was rooted in fraud for 20 years”. Cahuzac wept in the dock while giving evidence and hinted he had considered taking his own life rather than admit to lying. By the end of the trial he had repeatedly admitted his “inexcusable wrongdoing” and described it as a kind of “mechanical action” that was “very hard to stop”.
www.theguardian.com
The deeply damaging saga, in which Cahuzac spearheaded the left’s crusade against tax avoidance while secretly hiding millions of euros of his own money from French tax authorities, was the biggest scandal to hit Hollande’s presidency.
Cahuzac was appointed Hollande’s tax tsar in 2012 to lead the Socialist president’s crusade against wealthy tax-avoiders and make the rich pay their share of dragging France out of its economic woes.
But in 2013 he was forced to admit he had hidden his own money in an account in Switzerland for 20 years and lied about it to parliament. The saga wrecked Hollande’s carefully crafted reputation as a straightforward “Mr Normal” who would oversee an honest government. It increased the public mistrust in France’s political class.
Cahuzac and his ex-wife, Patricia Ménard, who was also jailed, jointly ran a hair-transplant business treating some of France’s biggest celebrities. They were found guilty of tax fraud, tax evasion and laundering the proceeds. They hid millions of euros from the tax authorities for two decades, moving their money across the world from Switzerland to Singapore and the Isle of Man.
The prosecutor Jean-Marc Toublanc said during the trial this autumn that Cahuzac’s family life “was rooted in fraud for 20 years”. Cahuzac wept in the dock while giving evidence and hinted he had considered taking his own life rather than admit to lying. By the end of the trial he had repeatedly admitted his “inexcusable wrongdoing” and described it as a kind of “mechanical action” that was “very hard to stop”.
France's honest tax system crusader convicted for hiding millions of euros
Jérôme Cahuzac, appointed by Hollande to lead clampdown on wealthy avoiders, hid cash in a secret Swiss account for 20 years
Last edited by a moderator:
