President from 2007 to 2012, he was found guilty of trying to illegally obtain information from a senior magistrate in 2014 about an ongoing investigation into his campaign finances.
The judge said Sarkozy did not have to serve time in prison. He could serve his sentence using an electronic bracelet at home.
The 66-year-old man is the first president to be sentenced to prison in modern French history.
The Paris prosecutor had asked for a two-year prison sentence and a two-year suspended sentence for Sarkozy and his co-defendants, his lawyer Thierry Herzog and former magistrate Gilbert Azibert.
Herzog and Azibert were found guilty and sentenced to prison.
After a lengthy investigation and legal complications, the trial began late last year. The judge handed Sarkozy’s sentence on Monday afternoon in front of a full court.
Dubbed the “wiretapping case”, it began in 2013, when investigators tapped phones belonging to Sarkozy and his lawyer Herzog, in the context of an investigation against Sarkozy.
They found that the two men had promised senior magistrate Gilbert Azibert a prestigious position in Monaco, in exchange for information about an ongoing investigation into allegations that Sarkozy accepted illegal payments from L’Oreal heiress Liliane Bettencourt for his successful campaign 2007 presidential election.
Sarkozy faces other charges. In just over two weeks, he will once again stand trial on charges of violating campaign finance rules during his failed reelection attempt in 2012 for working with a friendly public relations firm to hide the real cost of his campaign.
In another case, French prosecutors are investigating Libya’s alleged illegal campaign financing. Former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi reportedly provided Sarkozy’s 2007 campaign with millions of euros sent to Paris in suitcases.
In 2011, former President Jacques Chirac was found guilty of misusing public funds and received a two-year suspended prison sentence for employing fictional officials when he was mayor of Paris in the early 1990s.
The last French head of state to be sentenced to prison was Marshal Philippe Pétain in 1945 – for treason after collaborating with the Nazis.