Posted 30 Dec. 2022 at 15:01Updated 30 Dec. 2022 at 16:05
A page has been turned in the history of justice. From 1and January, the assize courts with popular jury see their field of jurisdiction restricted. This system inherited from the French Revolution, which involved six citizens chosen by lot from the electoral lists together with three judges to pronounce on criminal matters, partly leaves room for courts composed exclusively of professional magistrates, five in all.
These courts, called departmental criminal courts, have been experimented since 2019 and are now generalized to the whole territory. They intervene in the first instance on all crimes punishable by 15 or 20 years’ imprisonment committed by adults. In fact, they mainly deal with cases of sexual violence. Their perpetuation will deprive the Courts of Assizes of more than half of the cases tried.
Criminal proceedings
This reform finds its origin in the Belloubet law of 2019, which had started trials in fifteen departments. Its goal is “to guarantee a more rapid development of criminal proceedings and limit the practice of correction”, which consists in downgrading a crime to a crime, recalls the evaluation committee of the project in its November report.
The report he prepares shows that the trials of the departmental criminal courts, carried out between 2019 and 2022 on 387 cases, have provided satisfactory answers to the problems of declining “investigative capacity”. For identical disputes, the hearing times of these criminal courts thus turned out to be 12% shorter than those of an assize court. The time between the end of the preliminary investigation and the day the case is judged averages almost a year, which, in some cases, is two or three times faster than with the jury.
Furthermore, all the actors acknowledge that the principles of oral debate and adversarial procedure have been respected by the criminal courts of the pilot departments. The presence of the presidents of the courts of assizes in the new system guarantees the respect of the penal procedure.
Indemnity for jurors in assize courts
Another argument in favor of criminal courts: cost. An average hearing day costs about half in a system with professional judges, rather than with jurors receiving indemnity.
However, the generalization of these courses throughout the territory collides with a major problem: that of human resources. The evaluation committee deems a “significant strengthening” of magistrates and chancellors necessary and regrets that no “concrete figures” have been put forward. The Chancellery has promised to hire 1,500 magistrates and 1,500 clerks over the entire five-year period and arrivals are already expected, but this will not be enough to meet the immediate needs of 2023. There is also a lack of courtrooms.
On the other hand, the experiments did not allow to demonstrate that the criminal courts have reduced the correction, which constitutes a serious pitfall with respect to the objectives of the reform.
Connection between citizens and justice
These points did not fail to be raised on December 13 in the Assembly by the environmentalist deputy Francesca Pasquini, who is advancing a bill aimed at preserving the popular jury of the assize court. The elect questioned the Keeper of the Seals, referring to the fact that “more than half of the jurors of the assize courts will disappear”, which constitutes in her eyes, and in those of some magistrates and lawyers, a “democratic drama”. . Opponents of the reform deplore a disruption of the link between citizens and justice. But for Eric Dupond-Moretti “it is an insult to the magistrates to think that this is a matter of granted justice”.
