This is a theme that comes up with each presidential election: issues related to the police and justice. The True of False cell has gone around the statements of three candidates since the start of the campaign.
“Sentences of less than a year are not carried out”
We start with Valérie Pécresse, the candidate Les Républicains finds that too many convicted people escape prison: “Today, sentences of less than a year are almost systematically adjusted, they are no longer executed.” It is rather false. The sentence adjustment mentioned by Valérie Pécresse does exist, it provides that sentences of less than six months must be adjusted and that sentences between six and twelve months can be, but it is not systematic. If the justice considers that the conditions are not met, the person will go well in prison.
Moreover, if we look at the latest figures from the Penitentiary Administration, we can read there that out of the 47 or so 000 sentenced inmates currently in cells, just over 12 000 received a sentence of less than a year which they are therefore serving well behind bars.
“60% of the work of administrative magistrates concerns foreigners”
Marine Le Pen denounced in a meeting the congestion of the administrative courts, in particular because of immigration: “Think that 60% of the work of administrative magistrates concerns foreigners.”
This is false and it is even much less, according to the latest report of the Council of State, which reports each year on the activity of the administrative courts. In 2020, 37% of cases registered with the administrative court concerned foreigners. On appeal, it is a little over 50% and barely 15% before the Council of State. Clearly, the law of foreigners is indeed the first case dealt with in the administrative courts, but it does not represent the majority of cases.
“Black and Arab people are five times more likely to be stopped”
Yannick Jadot, the environmental candidate, talks about the sometimes discriminatory identity checks. “You know that the Defender of Rights himself said that if you are black or Arab, you are five times more likely to be controlled, it shocks and it is unworthy for a whole part of our youth.
It’s true, the Defender of Rights’ survey published in 2017 said that men perceived as black or Arab are five times more concerned by frequent identity checks. It’s even worse if the person is under 25. In this case, the risk of an inspection is multiplied by 20.