• The occupancy rate of the Seysses remand center, near Toulouse, is 186%.

  • According to the controller general of prisons, this overcrowding is added to unworthy hygienic conditions and a climate of permanent violence.

  • He asks the Ministers of Justice and of Health to take urgent measures.

A quarter of all mattresses on the floor in French prisons litter the cells of the Seysses remand center, about twenty kilometers from Toulouse.

And for good reason the establishment, opened in 2003 for 432 inmates in the men's quarter, currently houses 898, some of whom have a total of 1.28 m2 of personal space.

This extremely severe observation emanates from the team of Dominique Simonnot, the general controller of places of deprivation of liberty (CGLPL) who has just addressed to the Minister of Justice and that of Health "urgent recommendations" for the prison. de Seysses, after visiting the establishment from May 31 to June 11, 2021.

"Rats in walking areas strewn with rubbish"

Beyond the "dramatically high" overcrowding, the report published on Tuesday in

the Official Journal

points out, with supporting photos, "deplorable hygiene in premises in poor condition".

The cells are swarming with cockroaches and bedbugs, "rats run around the walkways strewn with rubbish".

To this environment is added a deleterious climate, dominated by violence, with prisoners for the most part idle who no longer dare to leave their cells and guards who avoid the promenade courtyard.

The controller general of prisons finally considers that "access to health care for detained persons is not guaranteed", in part because the prison has only one vehicle for medical extractions and that the telemedicine devices are there. very little used.

The CGLPL concludes by calling for "urgent measures concerning penal overcrowding, the renovation of cells, disinfection, access to care" but also "the taking back of the functioning of the establishment".

A new prison waiting

In a letter dated June 12, the Minister of Justice indicates "having taken note of all [of these] recommendations".

Eric Dupond-Moretti also recalls that his bill on confidence in the judicial institution includes provisions to “promote alternatives to provisional detention” and measures of “automatic release under duress” for short sentences.

Concerning access to care, the Minister of Health Olivier Véran evokes "a reassessment of the contract binding the prison administration to its subcontractor Sodexo".

Our prison file

In addition to this, you need to know more about it.

The state plans to build a new 600-place prison in the area to relieve congestion at the Seysses remand center and the nearby Muret power station.

But the project comes up against the opposition of some elected officials and residents.

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Toulouse: Transfer of a transgender detainee to the women's district after a judicial decision

  • Toulouse

  • Society

  • Violence

  • Jail

  • Hygiene

  • Insecurity