Delays of Justice: fault to magistrates?

Delays of Justice: fault to magistrates?

Tefy Andriamanana - Marianne. Monday, March 21, 2011 at 12: 01. Read 2037 times




The Act sets specific timelines in acts of criminal proceedings. However, lack, judges not always respect them even do drag sensitive files.





(Drawing: Louison)

Magistrates can disobey the law? This is yet the case in a case of paedophilia by Mediapart. In this case involving the project "The school boat" for facts of "rape and sexual assaults on minors of 15 years per person in authority" committed between 1979 and 1999, there are fourteen victims and put five review. The first complaint in this case was filed in 1999. But the first investigating judge Albert Cantinol, based at Fort-de-France, was withdrawn in 2006 by the Criminal Chamber of the Court of Cassation a legitimate suspicion motion filed by Mr. Eric Morain, counsel for the civil parties. The record then moved to Paris is heard by the judges and Nathalie Dutartre then Mylène Huguet.

This is the main problem arises. March 30, 2010, j. Huguet completes its investigation and sends the record to the Paris Prosecutor's Office so that it renders its requisitions within three months. This deadline is set byarticle 175 of the Code of criminal procedure, it is reduced to one month if a review implemented is in preventive detention, which is the case here. The public prosecutor could propose to the judge to send everyone to the tribunal or to a non-suit. But, after four months, even if the public prosecutor has not budged, the judge may announce the final closing of the investigation, deciding if there is reason or not a trial. The purpose of these delays is the third examination should be tried in a "". reasonable time ", principle recognized by French law.

But, despite the Act, the Paris Prosecutor's Office has not always made its requisitions and the folder is at a standstill. Joined by Médiapart, the Paris Prosecutor's Office has is justified: The section for minors a lot of work, and it must resolve the urgent priority "". In clear, folders with imprisoned persons are established top of the stack, too bad for others even if it is serious records. But, contacted by Marianne2, the Paris Prosecutor's Office has returned his statements Médiapart: " is a complex, heavy, record that problems of law ". In this case is indeed a problem of prescription of the facts. In this case, the limitation period is long: sexual attacks on minors may be sued 20 years after the majority of the victim. The Paris Prosecutor's Office also stated that this case "will be quickly resolved ", without giving any precise time



Inertia of the system

In the Attorney General of Paris, higher hierarchical of the short Attorney, it has the same explanation. " It is aware that it is long for the civil parties ", explains to Marianne2 speaking again of a " complex, long folder where requirements issues arise because the facts are old ." If the Prosecutor says that there is " No will delay anything ", he confirms that the Prosecutor's Office means him do not always meet the target dates set by the Act: " objectively, this delay may not be respected whenever ." However, the Prosecutor said " awareness " at the delay in this case and said to have " spoken." "with the Paris Prosecutor's Office.

Yet, this is not the first time that the inertia of the parquets problem. Another resounding case had also been blocked in the same way. In the case of Zyed and Bouna (the two youths killed in an EDF transformer in Clichy-sous-bois in 2005),14 months had elapsed (between July 2009 and September 2010) between the end of the statement and requisitions (for a non-suit for the police) of the public prosecutor of Bobigny. Here also, the time required for requisitions was three months. This delay was denounced at the time by Mr. Jean-Pierre Mignard, the lawyer of the families of victims.

But, as a general, the France has little or no was sanctioned for the slow pace of justice by the European Court of the human rights that evokes also this question of "". reasonable time" ". Article 6-1, the European Convention says that " has the right that his case be heard fairly, publicly and in a reasonable time, by an independent and impartial tribunal (...)". As such, the France was sentenced once in 2010 and twice in 2009, against 14 and 29 times for the Germany, according to the annual report of the Court. It is true that the case law of the ECHR has a strict definition of what is a " reasonable time " taking particular account of " the complexity of the case " to find out if the processing of a folder actually tooktoo much time between the beginning of the prosecution of a suspect and the end of his trial. That said, the deadlines set by French law in the cases cited remain still cheerfully exceeded.



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And beyond the conduct of judges, this slowness is the question of means of floors. In Europe, the France has less well with but also the more loaded floors in folders. According to a report of the Council of Europe, in 2008, the France had 3 prosecutors for 100,000 against 4.8 in Spain or 7.8 in Belgium.

The same year, on average, 2659 records arrived at the Office of a magistrate of the Prosecutor, against 2048 in Spain or 1899 in Austria. Of course, are counted in this batch a large share of simple cases that can be processed in a short time. There are also folders more complex where a trial judge will have to intervene. But the proposed reform of the criminal procedure confident floors all of judicial investigations and removing investigating judges may exacerbate the overload of the Crown.

In its jurisprudence, the ECHR but recalled the obligation of means of States arguing that "". section 6-1 of the Convention requires Contracting States to organize their judicial system so that the courts and tribunals can perform each of its requirements, including the duty to decide cases within a reasonable time" ". Similarly, the 3rd Chamber of civil court of Paris recently condemned the State to pay 12,000 euro heist for moral injury victim believing that justice took too long to find his attackers including due to a congestion of the Court of Assizes. " He returned to the State to provide the human and material resources to enable them to be used under normal conditions, without being able to rely on its own failure to be exempt from liability to its agents." "noted the tribunal in its judgment.

This issue of sorting in the court records dealing with the lack of resources had already been updated in the case of Pornic but regarding prison services insertion and probation. Following this case, the Inter-Regional Director of prison services in Rennes has been landed, the unions then protested arguing that the monitoring of Tony Meilhon missed was due to a budgetary problem and not to to the faults of a single person. Individual fault or collective responsibility, the debate concerns not only the offenders.