The deputies accepted on Monday June 8 in committee the compromise proposed by the government on the “guilty plea”, a flagship measure of the criminal justice bill which sparked a vast protest movement by lawyers.
The members of the Law Committee approved by show of hands the article containing the measure, after having adopted the government amendment limiting its scope, as part of the examination at first reading of the text. A success for the Minister of Justice Gérald Darmanin, subject to strong political and media pressure after the tragic death of Lyhanna, an 11-year-old girl whose alleged murderer had been the subject of several complaints.
A fragile success, however, and which will have to be confirmed in session, while both the RN and the left have said they are opposed to this major reform of the penal code.
The proposed procedure for the trial of recognized crimes (PJCR) provides that in exchange for an admission of the facts by the accused, he will be offered a sentence less than one third, with the hearing being reduced to half a day. The objective is to speed up the processing of cases, and to fight against the congestion of the courts, while trial delays are on average six years for rapes and eight years for homicides, according to the Chancellery.
Opposition from lawyers led the government to commit in mid-May to excluding rape and all crimes punishable by the Assize Court from the scope. Such a reduction in the scope of the PJCR would strongly limit its impact, since according to Gérald Darmanin this would only concern some “200 cases per year”, particularly in cases of fatal assaults and robberies.
Explicit agreement from victims
This was not enough to convince the PS, which denounced through the voice of Colette Capdevielle a procedure “totally orthogonal to French law and even to its philosophy”, considering that the hearing at the assizes is “a moment of absolute truth where the accused is confronted with reality”, a ritual “necessary to integrate the law”.
For the RN, Sylvie Josserand denounced a measure which would “lose all meaning to the sentence handed down, which would only be a negotiated sentence, priced rather than a sentence that carries meaning for the convicted person as well as for society”. LFI MP Gabrielle Cathala said she feared a “ratchet effect”, and that what is presented today “as an exception” would one day be “extended to all criminal offenses”.
The Minister of Justice highlighted the safeguards surrounding the measure, the perpetrator being able to appeal the negotiated sentence and the PJCR only being able to take place if the victim gives their “consent”. This aspect was also reinforced by an amendment from the rapporteurs, making the PJCR conditional on the explicit agreement of the victim, and not on their absence of opposition as provided for by the text.
Heard by deputies in the afternoon, Gérald Darmanin once again exposed the “serious failures” of state services which contributed to Lyhanna’s death. He also once again estimated that “it is not a new law (…) which would have changed anything” in this drama, any more than “additional means”.
But Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu announced Monday evening that he would bring together ministers concerned with child protection on Tuesday morning to decide on new legislative measures in response to Lyhanna’s death.
Wishing to “enrich” a bill already tabled on the protection of children, he also wants to accelerate the examination by the Council of State of a “comprehensive” bill against sexist and sexual violence, signed by around a hundred deputies and which received the support of the President of the Assembly, Yaël Braun-Pivet (Renaissance), on Monday.
