Lack of privacy, cockroaches, overcrowding, access to very complicated care and above all a situation that is not improving: the Ministry of Justice is once again summoned to explain itself to a court concerning the conditions of detention in one of its prisons, that of Seysses, near Toulouse.
Already in October 2021, the ministry had received the injunction to improve an unworthy situation in this remand center. According to the International Prison Observatory and the Toulouse Bar Association, almost nothing has changed in 18 months. These two entities have therefore again seized the judge in chambers of the administrative court of Toulouse. A hearing is scheduled for Tuesday, July 26 at 10 a.m.
Following the visit of the #jail from Toulouse-Seysses from @batonnierdunac last May, the@OIP_sectionfr and the Toulouse Bar Association are again seizing the Administrative Court to denounce unworthy detention conditions.https://t.co/Lipv3TC7kz
– Toulouse Bar (@BarreauToulouse) July 13, 2022
“Following the visit of the Toulouse-Seysses prison by the President of Toulouse last May, the OIP and the Toulouse Bar Association are once again seizing the Administrative Court to denounce the unworthy conditions of detention.informed the‘Toulouse Bar Association on Twitter.
Indeed, the detainees, who are more than a thousand for 600 places, complain. And during an unannounced visit to this remand center as he has the right to do, the President of Toulouse also noted that the urgent measures for improvement that the Ministry of Justice should bring have practically not been implemented. implemented.
The improvements are meager: a lick of paint and the reinstatement of the two daily walks for prisoners. But cockroaches still proliferate inside the prison, so prisoners have to sleep with toilet paper in their ears so the bugs don’t get in. For lack of sufficient places, the detainees sometimes sleep on mattresses on the ground, they are regularly three occupants in cells of less than eleven square meters.
“The urgent applications judge had ordered the partitioning of the toilets from the rest of the cell, reports Me Julien Brel, lawyer for the International Observatory of Prisons and the Order of Lawyers of the Toulouse Bar. What was found is that there are shower curtains that have been put up. Shower curtains don’t provide privacy.The lawyer continues:Second example, the toilets in the courtyard are still in a disgusting state!“
The principle of the deprivation of liberty is not the deprivation of the right to dignity.
These problems have already been criticized by the courts, without effect, he criticizes: “The Ministry of Justice has been sanctioned, condemned, and behind it does not execute the order that was issued in the name of the French people!“
The lawyer now hopes that the judge will set a deadline for the Ministry of Justice to respect the injunctions that have already been made to him, this time with a penalty payment, a fine to be paid for each day of delay. Asked by franceinfo, the Ministry of Justice did not wish to react.