Teenagers aged 14 or 15, locked in cells for several hours, then released the next day without the slightest prosecution. While the Ministry of Justice has counted more than 5,000 people in police custody since the start of the movement in mid-September – 87% of whom are minors – a question is now openly being asked: has police custody become a sanction in itself?
The figures published Monday by the Chancellery speak for themselves: out of 5,060 placements in police custody, only 1,802 people are subject to prosecution (35.6%). The rest resulted in 790 dismissals and 1,376 alternatives to prosecution. Across the entire territory, only four minors were placed in pre-trial detention.
“We are talking about kids in police custody when most of the time, there is no action because no offense has been committed,” reframes Karine Bourdié, co-president of the Association of Criminal Lawyers (ADAP). We are facing a kind of all-out repression that does not take care to sort things out. Which would however be the first requirement when dealing with minors. »
A “fishing net” to make money?
However, the Code of Criminal Procedure is strict: police custody can only be decided if it constitutes the “only means” of bringing an investigation to a successful conclusion. “But there, we have the impression that they are casting a fishing net, that we are catching everyone and that we are putting everyone in jail,” denounces the Parisian lawyer. These police detentions are decided without even worrying about their legal justification. We place them in police custody to punish ab initio, outside the control of the judicial institution, and then we release them. »
On the side of the Union of Lawyers of France (SAF), the observation is identical. “We see on the ground that the number of prosecutions is ridiculous. If there is no prosecution, it is because a priori no offense is reproachable, raises its president, Stéphane Maugendre. We had already experienced this in other movements, but here it has multiplied and it affects minors. The idea is to scare young people and parents. »And therefore to dissuade them from coming back to demonstrate?
In the police stations, the shock is severe for high school students faced with police custody for the first time. “We strip the person in custody of everything, his phone, his shoelaces, his belt... There is nothing to wash, we stay in our clothes. We are put in a cube with a concrete bench. It stinks, describes Stéphane Maugendre. We are cut off from everything. To go to the toilet, the police must still be available. This only fuels these young people’s suspicion of the police. »
Justice faced with a “fait accompli”
Beyond the dilapidation of the cells, criminal lawyers are concerned about procedural abuse. In principle, police custody is an investigative measure directed by the prosecutor. By increasing the number of arrests in front of high schools to decontaminate the streets, the police are reversing the roles. “The police almost ask the judicial institution to validate their mass arrests a posteriori,” points out Karine Bourdié. In a column published by Le Nouvel Obs and signed by 52 former Secretaries of the internship conference, the lawyers draw up the same assessment: “It is no longer justice which supervises the police, it is the police which seize the justice of a fait accompli. »
On the ground, this influx congests services and weakens defense rights. “Colleagues mobilized on duty report to us a speech which tends to avoid resorting to a lawyer,” warns the co-president of ADAP. However, it is an essential right, especially when it concerns a minor. » An observation shared by Stéphane Maugendre. “We should not generalize, but we have had some feedback,” indicates the president of Saf. Police officers are sometimes a little light-hearted with the Code of Criminal Procedure. For example, we try to do things without the presence of a lawyer, completely illegally. »
Our file on the high school movement
