The standoff continues between the lawyers and Gérald Darmanin. The Minister of Justice regretted on Monday April 13 the positions of the opponents of his bill examined in the Senate, defending a necessary reform according to him in the face of “the collapse of criminal justice”, after a day of mobilization by lawyers. “We hear criticisms and sometimes caricatures, and I hope that the debate will allow us to respond to them,” launched the Minister of Justice, hoping to achieve “a consensus text”, at the opening of the debates in the Senate hemicycle. Until Tuesday, senators will focus on the bill on criminal justice, widely criticized by lawyers who oppose the emblematic measure of the text: the establishment of a new “guilty plea” procedure in criminal matters.
Thousands of lawyers gathered during the day in several cities in France for a “dead justice” operation against the reform, fearing that it would open the way to “expeditious justice” to the detriment of the rights of the defense and victims. The guilty plea procedure, which will require the agreement of all parties, aims to reduce the constantly increasing volume of criminal cases. The penalty could not exceed two thirds of the maximum incurred and would be subject to negotiation. The hearing would then be reduced to half a day, without witnesses or experts.
“Faced with a tsunami,…) perhaps the collapse of our criminal justice”, this project “intends not to accelerate or make justice expeditious, but to make it more or less humane”, defended Gérald Darmanin. “Change is always difficult,” he continued, recalling that “nothing in this trial will be on the cheap”, that “no hearing is hidden from the public” and that “nothing will be botched” in the future system. “Years of waiting avoided are not accounting figures, but lives restored to victims who can rebuild their lives,” added the Minister of Justice, welcoming “a step forward which we would be wrong to deprive ourselves of”.
Originally published at Almouwatin.com
