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The Constitutional Council seized of the offense of breach of confinement

2020-05-13T13:36:25.427Z



The offense of violation of confinement, denounced as " tinkered " and violating fundamental rights, will be examined by the Constitutional Council, according to the decision rendered Wednesday by the Court of Cassation.

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Created by the law of state of health emergency, this offense (article L.3136-1 of the code of public health) provides that a person fined more than three times for violation of confinement within 30 days is punishable by six months' imprisonment and a fine of 3,750 euros. The Court of Cassation, seized of several priority questions of constitutionality (QPC) concerning this article, considered that the challenged provision was " likely to infringe the principle of legality of the offenses and the penalties which results " and the " principle of the presumption of innocence ".

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" The legislator created an offense characterized by the repetition of simple verbalizations repressing the ignorance of obligations or prohibitions whose content could not be defined with sufficient precision in the law which refers to a decree of the Prime Minister ", asserts the highest jurisdiction of the judiciary. " It is a first victory, " immediately responded Patrice Spinosi, one of the applicants' lawyers with Bertrand Perier. " This crime was tinkered with at the last minute by the legislator with a logic of repressive bidding. The urgency rarely goes hand in hand with the rigor which the parliament must show in criminal matters, ”he told AFP.

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During the hearing on Tuesday, the applicants denounced the creation of an offense, under the jurisdiction of the criminal court, which would be the consequence of the accumulation of tickets (for breach of confinement), under the jurisdiction of the police court. Me Perier had pointed out the vagueness of the text, which " does not allow the offense to be characterized " and denounced the violation of the right to an effective remedy.

The lawyer had in fact noted that the legal deadline for contesting the contravention was 45 days (and increased to 90 under a state of emergency) while the new offense provides for a repeat of the offense (more than three times) " Within 30 days ". What would happen to a man sentenced to prison if one or all of his tickets, challenged within the statutory time limits, were canceled, he asked. The Advocate General had also declared himself in favor of a transmission to the " wise men ", severely criticizing the " lack of precision of the text ", in particular concerning " the margin of appreciation of the police, which includes a significant risk which borders on arbitrariness ”.

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Source: lefigaro

All news articles on 2020-05-13

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