Tensions erupted in several French prisons on Wednesday, the day the suspension of visiting rooms came into effect in order to combat the spread of the new coronavirus in detention, we learned from concordant sources. In several penitentiary establishments, prisoners who were on a walk refused to reintegrate their cells, requiring in the majority of cases an intervention of the Eris (regional intervention and security teams), indicated the direction of the prison administration. (DAP) to AFP.
These refusals to reintegrate were sometimes accompanied by degradations but were settled calmly and the return to the cell was done without violence, according to the DAP. In some establishments, the situation was still tense at the end of the day. These incidents took place in the prisons of Bois d'Arcy (Yvelines), Villefranche-sur-Saône (Rhône), in Lyon-Corbas, Aiton (Savoie), Grenoble and Reims.
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While France is placed in confinement to fight against the Covid-19 epidemic, the Keeper of the Seals Nicole Belloubet announced Tuesday the suspension of the visiting rooms for the families and relatives of the detainees for a minimum of 15 days. The walks were maintained between the walls of 188 French prisons.
According to Emmanuel Baudin, national secretary of the FO-Penitentiary union, tensions started on Wednesday morning in the Bois-d'Arcy prison where around fifty detainees refused to return to their cell after a walk.
There have also been incidents at Réau prison (Seine-et-Marne). Twenty-five detainees, who are in an “open doors” regime, which allows them to move outside their cell, have regrouped and “tore off the neon lights and put trash cans in front of the gates,” according to Cyril Fay, local representative. of FO-Penitentiary.
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In order to ease the climate in detention, Emmanuel Baudin asked that all detainees have access to televisions and that landlines be free. He also asked "a minimum nest egg" for those who usually work for outside companies and who now find themselves without resources, so that they can "for example buy cigarettes" .
The coronavirus made the first victim among the detainees: a 74-year-old man, incarcerated in Fresnes (Val-de-Marne) and the only detainee tested positive in France, died Monday evening.