Tuesday, October 4, 2011

More details from Princess Helene

The French press continues to report on what Princess Helene told police investigators on September 8.  Her estranged husband, Thierry Gaubert, has been implicated in several financial scandals.   She said that French president Nicolas Sarkozy, a long time friend of her husband, began to distance himself after Thierry in 1995 after Thierry was first linked to improprieties.

Princess Helene told police that "Mr. Sarkozy came twice with my parents in Palm Beach, at the invitation of Thierry.  I do not know who paid for the tickets."  She also spoke about a spontaneous "weekend in Venice." "We were with Sarkozy,  Mr.  Philippe Smadja and his wife, and Jean-Jacques de Peretti, former mayor of Sarlat. It was in 1992, 1993."

"Thierry had organized this little trip to thank Nicolas Sarkozy for his kindness and because he was a friend at the time.  We flew Air France, business class.  We stayed in an expensive hotel.  Sarkozy had a suite and a single room.  The name of the hotel was, I believe, Ciprani.  I can tell you that Thierry and Philippe Smadja paid for the whole trip."

Apparently, Sarkozy had not been satisfied with the single room, but wanted a suite, which was "lavishly decorated" with "two marble bathrooms.

She also spoke about the house her husband had built in Colombia in 2001.  She said the house was gigantic, more than 1000 meters."  She added:  "Thierry had delusions of grandeur."

The house cost $600,000, and included a gigantic pool.   The house, she said, was paid for in cash out of a suitcase from an account in the Bahamas.

Helene told about her husband and arms dealer Zia Takieddine would travel by train from Paris to London and then by plane to Switzerland to obtain money from a bank  "more precisely a safe " and then would return to London and then by train to Paris.

Interesting that Helene uses the term "mes parents" as it is Princess Maria Pia and Prince Michel de Bourbon-Parma who have owned a home in Palm Beach, Florida, for many years.

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