Further Consequences
The scandal brought in a remarkable range of personalities from politics, high society and the literary-intellectual elite of Paris. Mistinguett was asked why she had been photographed with Stavisky at a nightclub; Georges Simenon reported on the unfolding affair and Stavisky's ex-bodyguard threatened him with physical violence; Colette, referring to the inability of any of Stavisky's high-placed friends to remember him, described the dead con artist as "a man with no face".
The trial of 20 people associated with Stavisky began in 1935. Printed charges were 1200 pages long. All of the accused, including Stavisky's widow, two Deputies, and one general, were acquitted the next year. The amount involved was estimated to be equal to eighteen million contemporary dollars plus an additional fifty-four million that came within months of fruition. The location of Stavisky's wealth is still unknown.
The Stavisky Affair left France internally weakened. France remained deeply divided for the rest of the decade, but the political weaknesses it exposed and exacerbated were not confined to France. The Stavisky Affair was emblematic of a broader erosion of democratic values and institutions in post–World War I Europe.
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