There, former International Monetary Fund chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn will go into the dock with twelve others on charges of involvement in organised prostitution.
Fighting to save the last shreds of his reputation, Strauss-Kahn is expected to claim he did not know his many sex partners were hired.
Four years ago, "DSK", as he is known throughout France, was at the zenith of his powers. Silver-haired and oozing confidence, the boss of the IMF determined the economic fate of indebted countries.
In France, as a former Finance Minister esteemed for his intelligence and suave manners, he was widely seen as a shoo-in for the presidency.
But sex was his downfall.
In Paris, his philanderings were common knowledge to the ruling elite. But the gossip remained firmly in the realm of dinner parties. Journalists knew but did not report anything, under the claimed principle that a politician's private life is his own business.
All that changed on May 14, 2011, when New York police boarded an Air France jet at JFK as it was preparing for takeoff. DSK was hauled out of first class and charged with a criminal sex act, attempted rape and unlawful imprisonment of a Guinean hotel maid at the city's luxury Sofitel hotel.
Howls of protest were raised back home as a prospective French president was made to do the notorious "perp walk" in handcuffs.
France's smart set denounced a plot to sabotage the hopes of a leading socialist. Others sniggered at America's Protestant hypocrisy when it came to sex.
But many opinions changed or were quietly shelved as shocking details of the allegations emerged, along with unsavoury details of his sexual approaches to women journalists in France.
The New York charges were dropped in August 2011 after prosecutors revealed Diallo had lied about her background, undermining her potential on the witness stand.
DSK returned to France to try to rebuild his career, with his journalist wife, Anne Sinclair, standing loyally beside him.
He set out on the comeback trail with a dramatic "I apologise, I made misjudgments" TV interview, combined with a few gigs as an economic guru.
But more misery was in store, and it proved fatal for his name and his marriage.
What comes up on Monday is the final, gruesomely public phase in a probe that began in early 2011, when police in Lille began to probe a high-class vice ring - a path that led to DSK.
Strauss-Kahn has told prosecutors that the sex games were "soirees libertines" - translatable as "swingers' nights" - and he did not suspect the women were prostitutes because he was introduced to them by senior police officers.
"On reflection, I may have been a little naive," he said in 2012.
Whether or not the public believes this may be less important than the details that are aired in court.
"Any further sordid revelations will once again remind the French public of how a respected public figure apparently ignored - or even deliberately courted - the risks inherent in such a licentious environment, whatever its legality," Jocelyn Evans, a professor of French politics at Britain's Leeds University, told the Herald.
Investigators have compiled a 210-page report that includes tales of anal sex without a condom and an orgiastic scene in which "seven or eight girls" serviced DSK at one time.
In texts to his contacts, Strauss-Kahn asks them to bring "material", a term that he later acknowledged was a codeword for women.
Two northern France newspapers, La Voix du Nord and Nord Eclair, last week published a 40-page "Affaire du Carlton" supplement to help readers understand the upcoming trial.
DSK still has supporters. They note that he is not accused of rape or sexual assault or under-age sex, but simply of paying for prostitutes who willingly performed their services in exchange for a fee. A poll conducted by TNS-Sofres this month, found that 22 per cent of French voters wanted DSK to return to national political life; among Socialist Party voters that figure climbs to 27 per cent.
If his career is in ruins, DSK will at least have had a lasting impact on an unwritten law of silence.
In private, politicians and journalists may have been disgusted by DSK, found him to be a misogynist or so flawed in his judgment that he was unsuitable for high office. But out of fear or self-censorship or principle, none ever brought these concerns to the attention of the public.
Today, France's omerta has loosened, but not entirely gone away.
Last year, the celebrity magazine Closer ran photos of President Francois Hollande riding a scooter to a tryst with an actress. The splash led many to criticise Hollande about security, abuse of public money, a lack of focus on his job or even having a tacky sense of style. But few criticised the affair itself. At the time, Hollande was in a relationship with another woman, journalist Valerie Trierweiler, whom he had elevated to the status of first lady.
"In France, we are very tolerant about these [sexual] issues. We don't judge politicians by their sex life," political commentator Philippe Moreau Chevrolet told the Herald.
"But we have seen a change since the DSK affair, because people now see how it can affect political performance. You have to have an image, and if your personal life gets in the way, you won't be able to work properly. So people are starting to change, but not because of sexual morals."
