A minister with a reversed forehead. Eric Dupond-Moretti announced on Twitter, Saturday August 20, the opening of an investigation, “so that all light may be shed” on the images of the “Kohlanness” competition, a game between prisoners and guards, inspired by the TF1 game Koh Lanta, within the prison of Fresnes (Val-de-Marne).
After the shocking images from Fresnes prison, I immediately ordered an investigation to shed light. The fight against recidivism goes through reintegration but certainly not through karting!
— Eric Dupond-Moretti (@E_DupondM) August 20, 2022
The Keeper of the Seals immediately mentioned “shocking pictures” about in particular the karting race organized in the courtyard of the prison… before finding himself well isolated. Very quickly, the Keeper of the Seals was accused of yielding to the extreme right, in the front line in the denunciation of this event within the prison of Fresnes: some are therefore surprised by this position taken by Eric Dupond- Moretti, whether among the Insoumis or among the ecologists. But also within the majority itself.
>> Karting at Fresnes prison: do we really have the right to organize such an event in a prison?
With his voice rather classified on the left within the government, from July 2020, for his first visit as Keeper of the Seals, Eric Dupond-Moretti had moreover chosen Fresnes and then said to himself “concerned“by the conditions of detention. The former criminal lawyer known for his numerous acquittals had even been applauded by detainees, shouting at the time of his passage”come defend us“and singing”acquittor“, His nickname.
Two years later, everything is different. The images of the karting race, organized on July 27, broadcast on social networks on Friday August 19, caused several elected officials from the National Rally and Republicans to react, such as deputy Éric Ciotti. Eric Dupond-Moretti reacts quickly and strongly to the outbidding of several personalities on the right and close to the far right. “He has totally changed tack compared to his founding act“, slips a framework of the majority.
On the one hand, the minister found the images “shocking“and immediately ordered an investigation, on the other, no word on the difficult conditions of detention while the penitentiary center of Fresnes counted, on January 1, 2022, 1,956 prisoners for 1,531 places, therefore even if it meant attracting the wrath of the left. And the ecologist senator Thomas Dossus to speak of a minister “who tap dances in front of the extreme right“.
“He probably understood that a nuanced position would not be tenable in public opinion.”
A ministerial adviser,at franceinfo
During the legislative elections, Eric Dupond-Moretti multiplied his trips to the field for, as he said then, “block the RN“. A result that has not always been there: the arrival of the minister with undeniable charisma in Gironde, in the Bouches-du-Rhône, or in the Somme did not in fact prevent the RN candidates from be elected. During the regional elections, in June 2021, he appeared on the list led in Hauts-de-France by the then Secretary of State for Pensions, Laurent Pietraszewski. A candidacy in particular to challenge the National Rally. : elimination in the first round with 9.13% of the vote, far behind the RN list of Sébastien Chenu (25.64%).
So is Eric Dupond-Moretti reviewing his strategy? “There is a new member of the Darmanin line“, taunts a framework of the majority for whom the Keeper of the Seals, as a non-professional in politics, “suffers the events more than he gives the ‘la'”. So no strategy. For another adviser, on the contrary, the minister “sees clearly that it is not by embodying lax justice that he will weigh in on public opinion and in a government that leans to the right“.
Emmanuel Macron renewed his confidence in him by keeping him Place Vendôme at the start of the new five-year term. The suspicions of illegal taking of interest which continue to weigh on the Minister of Justice did not constitute an obstacle to his renewal.