The State condemned for the “unworthy conditions of detention” of a woman for 40 days in Mulhouse prison

The inmate cohabited, in 2018, with four other prisoners in a cell of less than 12 square meters in this Haut-Rhin remand center.

The Strasbourg administrative court condemned the State for “unworthy conditions of detention” at the Mulhouse remand center (Haut-Rhin), where five inmates lived together in a cell of less than 12 square meters, AFP learned on Wednesday November 29. In its decision, dated November 16, the court recognizes the “moral harm” suffered by a detainee, incarcerated from May 18 to June 27, 2018 in Mulhouse, and orders the State to pay 1,000 euros “under reparation”.

Out of 40 days of detention, the inmate spent the first ten in a cell “reserved for new arrivals, with an area of ​​6.46 square meters, which she shared with another inmate”, reveals the court decision. Then, she spent 30 days in a cell measuring 11.81 square meters, which she shared with four other inmates. The court emphasized “the over-occupancy of this last cell”leaving each inmate “less than 3 m2 of individual space, not including the floor space of the furniture (bunk beds, table, chairs, toilets)”. The inmate “was incarcerated in undignified conditions (…) for a total period of 40 days”concludes the court.

“A sadly common situation in France”

“This is a fair application of the case law of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) and a situation that has been sadly common in France for many years”reacted to AFP the lawyer for the detainee’s family, Coralie Maignan. “What particularly bothers me is to see that despite these cascading convictions, we see no improvement on a daily basis in French prisons”she added.

Overcrowding is an endemic problem in French prisons. This situation has caused France to be condemned on several occasions by the ECHR, the last time in July for the conditions of detention in the Fresnes prison (Val-de-Marne).