International Journal on Criminology Volume 3, Number 2, Fall 2015 | Page 132

International Journal on Criminology
But however effective it might be, investigation is nothing without equally
effective sentencing.
B: Effective Sentencing, a Condition of the Right to Security
Seventy-five percent of French people agree that “justice is not working,” and the
press does not hesitate to echo this sentiment. Here are a few extracts:
The court found the two accused guilty of all three offences, namely
aggravated theft and two attempted thefts. . . . Haron O., who had
previous convictions, was given 4 years with an arrest warrant. But the
youth was not led out flanked by two policemen; he had already left
by the time the judgment was announced. “Already left” a courthouse
from which, at the moment of being sentenced, one can leave at will,
under the nose of magistrates looking helplessly. 2
That is assuming they could actually have done something about it. . . . Under current
law, nothing allows the magistrate to stop the flight of a defendant appearing freely
before the criminal court. When it comes to a deliberation at the Assize Court, the
presiding judge enjoins the accused not to leave the courtroom during the time of
deliberation, and asks the head of security to ensure compliance with this instruction.
The introduction of a similar authority at criminal courts would enhance the
credibility of the institution.
Yet formal changes cannot fix fundamental flaws. The discontinuation of the
automatic revocation of suspended sentences [sursis simples] when a further offence
is committed, as established by the law of August 15, 2014, has effectively rendered
120,000 sentences per year fictional. Legal experience has already shown the highly
debatable effect of suspended sentences. Under this regime, numerous defendants
now have to appear in court again to maintain that they were never convicted.
With automatic revocation abolished, judges sometimes forget to pronounce on the
revocation, and indeed often refuse to proceed with it, considering that it would
amount to a kind of “double jeopardy.” Or, better yet, they reduce the imprisonment
they wish to impose in due proportion to the existing suspended sentence. The
circular of December 17, 2014 added further alterations to the law, indicating that a
suspended sentence passed by a collegiate court cannot be revoked by a court ruling
alone. . . .
The harmony of a score cannot abide bad tuning. In penal law, we tend to
make more use of flat than of sharp, to the extent that the right note is lost. As just
one example, take the authority granted to the judge to pass a sentence in court.
2
Xavier Raufer, “Justice: Chronique d’une faillite annoncée,” Le Nouvel Économiste, last updated March
3, 2014, http://www.lenouveleconomiste.fr/justice-chronique-dune-faillite-annoncee-21746/.
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