The Nantes court has signed an agreement with La Croix Rouge and the association Les P'tits Gilets.
The objective is to distribute to people in need clothes and objects that should have been destroyed.
These exhibits were confiscated from the perpetrators or belonged to victims who did not claim them.
Vehicles, screens, telephones, watches, furniture… Each year, tons of very diverse personal objects are stored by the courts following criminal cases.
These pieces of evidence, sometimes voluminous, were most often confiscated from the perpetrators of offences.
In some cases, they belonged to victims who did not claim them.
What to do with all this?
If a small part is returned to their owners, another sold at auction for the benefit of the State, the majority of the “seals” are generally destroyed.
A "mess" against which the Nantes court decided to fight.
An agreement was thus signed on Wednesday with two charities (La Croix Rouge and Les P'tits Gilets).
Objective: to give them "regularly" clothes placed in the hands of justice.
The first six boxes filled with warm clothes, coats or shoes have already been delivered, while around thirty additional boxes will be delivered at the end of the week.
Their content will be offered, via the associations, to homeless people encountered during marauding in the Nantes metropolitan area.
“Much more useful and sensible to give them away”
“These clothes were previously going to be destroyed.
It is much more useful and sensible to give them to people in need, ”explains Franck Bielitzki, president of the Nantes court.
“They were in excellent condition, sometimes new, still in plastic wrap.
This destruction hurt everyone's hearts, starting with our registry officers.
They are the ones who alerted us, ”adds Renaud Gaudeul, public prosecutor, stressing that a similar initiative also exists in Metz (Moselle).
In addition to clothes, the justice boxes contain a few toys and video games for families in great precariousness in the run-up to Christmas.
“We are very happy with this collaboration, rejoices Olivier Van Cauter, president of the Nantes unit of the Red Cross.
It provides an answer to our needs.
I recently met people who hadn't been able to change for two months.
It is also in tune with the times with this idea of fighting against waste.
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Weapons, drugs and counterfeits destroyed
Delivery to associations, however, requires a lot of sorting work within the Nantes court's evidence department, which manages no less than 10,000 new seals each year.
“It is necessary to check the good condition, to verify the exhaustion of legal remedies, to rule out counterfeits.
For an ethical reason, we are also careful not to donate any object concerned by a blood crime, ”explains Pascale Bonjean, director of the transplant.
Among the seizures of justice, narcotics, weapons, cigarettes, counterfeits are systematically destroyed.
Vehicles and computer equipment are usually resold by the Domains, or even reassigned to law enforcement.
The Red Cross has the support of 300 volunteers for its humanitarian activities in the Nantes conurbation.
Created in 2018, the association Les P'tits Gilets mobilizes a hundred volunteers for its marauding in the streets of Nantes.
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