Maurice Papon (; 3 September 1910 – 17 February 2007) was a French civil servant and Nazi collaborator who was convicted of crimes against humanity committed during the occupation of France. Papon led the police in major prefectures from the 1930s to the 1960s, before he became a Gaullist politician. When he was secretary general for the police in Bordeaux during World War II, he participated in the deportation of more than 1,600 Jews. He is also known for his activities in the Algerian War (1954–1962), during which he tortured insurgent prisoners as prefect of the Constantinois department, and ordered, as prefect of the Paris police, the deadly repression of a pro-National Liberation Front (FLN) demonstration against a curfew that he had "advised".
In 1961, Maurice Papon was personally awarded the Legion of Honour by French President Charles de Gaulle, whose government had been struggling with the FLN insurgency. Papon also commanded the Paris police in the Charonne subway massacre and the Paris massacre of 1961, during which between 200 and 300 Algerian demonstrators were deliberately killed by the Paris police. Forced to resign in 1967 after the suspicious forced disappearance of the Moroccan Marxist Mehdi Ben Barka, with de Gaulle's support he was named as president of Sud Aviation, the company which co-developed Concorde.
After May 1968, Papon was elected as a member of the French National Assembly and served several terms. From 1978 to 1981, he served in the cabinet of Prime Minister Raymond Barre under President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing. Between the two rounds of the May 1981 presidential election, where Giscard d'Estaing was running for a second term, details about Papon's past were leaked in newspaper. Documents signed by Papon were made public that showed his responsibility in the deportation of 1,690 Bordeaux Jews to Drancy internment camp from 1942–44. After a long investigation and protracted legal wranglings, he was eventually tried.
In 1998, Papon was convicted of crimes against humanity. He was released from prison early, in 2002, for ill health. He died in 2007.
Early life
Papon was born in Gretz-Armainvilliers, Seine-et-Marne, the son of a solicitor who became an industrialist. In 1919, when Papon was nine years old, his father was elected mayor in the commune and held that office until 1937. His father was also local representative (conseiller général) of Tournan-en-Brie and president of the canton's council in 1937.
Papon studied at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand, in Paris. Fellow students at the elite school were Georges Pompidou, later President of France, and René Brouillet, who would join Charles de Gaulle's cabinet after the war. Papon entered Sciences-Po, the specialty university for future civil servants and politicians, and he studied law, psychology and sociology.
Early career
After entering public service at the age of 20, Papon was quickly promoted. During the second Cartel des gauches, in February 1931, he worked in the cabinet of the Minister of Air, Jean-Louis Dumesnil. He was named in the Ministry of Interior in July 1935 before he became chief of staff of the deputy director of departmental and communal affairs, in January 1936, under Maurice Sabatier.
In June 1936, during the Popular Front government, he was attached to the cabinet of Radical-Socialist François de Tessan, the vice-state secretary to the presidency of the council as well as a friend of his father. He became a member of the Ligue d'action universitaire républicaine et socialiste, a Radical-Socialist youth group; Pierre Mendès France was also a member.
In Camille Chautemps's government, François de Tessan was appointed as sub-state secretary to Foreign Affairs and selected Papon as his parliamentary attaché in March 1938.
World War II
Mobilised on 26 August 1939 in the 2nd colonial infantry regiment, Papon was sent to Tripoli, then under Italian control. He was assigned to direct the French secret services in Ras-el-Aïn, in Lebanon. He was then assigned to Syria. After his return in November 1940, following the fall of France, Papon agreed to serve the Vichy government. His mentors, Jean-Louis Dumesnil and Maurice Sabatier, voted on 10 July 1940 to grant all power to Philippe Pétain.