The Minister of the Interior…of Justice, sorry, had an idea. Again. “France is capable, despite the budgetary difficulties, of isolating the few dozen, the hundred or so network heads to send an extremely strong signal and show the voluntarism of the State,” assured the new Minister of Justice, Gérald Darmanin, at the outcome of a trip to the Paris court.
To do this, he explained, it will be necessary to “reinforce resources, perhaps isolate in certain particular penitentiary centers, jamming” of cell phones in certain cells.
“Model applied to the greatest terrorists”
Gérald Darmanin announced Saturday evening in an interview with Parisian wanting to establish reinforced isolation of the “100 biggest drug traffickers” who continue their criminal activities from their cells, “inspired by the model applied to the biggest terrorists” in prison.
“I do not necessarily need a legislative text for this”, penitentiary isolation being an administrative measure, he clarified on Sunday during a press briefing, without however detailing the organization of this regime of private detention while prison overcrowding breaks records with 80,130 detainees as of November 1st.
“With a few million more (euros), good organization, voluntarism, very committed civil servants […] In the coming months, we will have put people out of harm’s way who continue to sow death in the French streets,” the minister promised.
“It’s a real subject”
“We have dangerous inmates almost everywhere. We need specific establishments for this type of detainee,” Emmanuel Baudin, secretary general of FO Justice, responded to AFP. Drug traffickers manage “so much money”, have “such a network that it is absolutely necessary to isolate them, it’s a real subject”, adds Emmanuel Baudin.
Magistrates specializing in organized crime are also calling for “a special prison regime for criminals who, from their cell, continue their criminal activities”, recalls one of them, taking the example of the special regime established by the Italy for the mafiosi. “Even if you place a jammer at the foot of a criminal's cell, he finds a way to get his messages across to another inmate and within a few minutes he continues his activities,” he emphasizes.
“Ineffective measure”, “dramatic consequences”
Wanting reinforced isolation “is completely ignoring what isolation is: a white torture, an ineffective measure with dramatic consequences on the physical and psychological health of individuals”, believes on the contrary Romain Boulet, president of the association criminal lawyers.
“This administrative measure will be decided on the basis of prison intelligence, a label which will fall on someone suspected of being one of the biggest drug traffickers without respect for the presumption of innocence, without us knowing what led to such a label, and which will be almost impossible to challenge,” he fears.
For lawyer Bruno Rebstock, “while the prison situation has never been so degraded […] the new Minister of Justice only aims to recreate under another name the high security districts”, abandoned in 1982. “By becoming accustomed to these exceptional regimes, we assimilate the common law offender to terrorists, to whom we now reserve the same fate,” sighs criminal lawyer Raphaël Chiche.
“Think about walls around detainees and not the other way around”
The new tenant of Place Vendôme also intends to “detain people sentenced to short, or even very short, sentences in prisons with a maximum of a few dozen places”. These new places of detention would be built quickly, thanks in particular to less strict specifications, he estimated on Sunday.
“We need specific establishments, light prisons” which would allow petty criminals to serve their sentences “without being mixed with experienced thugs”, adds a magistrate. But these new prisons should be adapted to the profile of the prisoners, she insists. “We need to think about the walls around the detainees and not the other way around. We are asked to work miracles on issues of execution of sentences, reintegration and the fight against recidivism in prison buildings dating from the 19th century,” she regrets.
Another magistrate wonders: will the Minister of Justice integrate this proposal into the law on the adjustment of prison sentences of less than six months or modify this law? “He wasn’t clear.”
