This Wednesday, July 5, the justice bill carried by Éric Dupond-Moretti has reached a new milestone. MEPs backed the remote activation of mobile phones by authorities in some investigations. This controversial provision of the text will authorize filming and listening to suspects without their knowledge.
“Very dangerous slope” or “technological adaptation”? A majority of the Assembly in any case approved the article which carries this measure, by 80 votes against 24. The deputies of the presidential camp, LR and RN voted in favor. Those of Nupes, firmly opposed to this measure, voted against, like the president of the Liot group, Bertrand Pancher.
The article allows the remote activation of mobile phones, computers and other connected objects in two distinct cases. The first device authorizes geolocation to follow in real time the movements of persons targeted as part of an investigation for a crime or misdemeanor punishable by at least five years of imprisonment.
The second part allows remote capture of sounds and images of people targeted this time in cases of terrorism as well as delinquency and organized crime. The capture only concerns “dozens of cases per year”, insists Éric Dupond-Moretti.
The left is upwind against these provisions of “intrusion into private life”, LFI evoking an “authoritarian drift” and recalling the criticisms of lawyers or NGOs.
An amendment by the deputy of the presidential camp Naïma Moutchou (Horizons) specifies that the recording must be put in place “when the nature and seriousness of the facts justify it” and “for a duration strictly proportionate” to the objective.
But, for the Minister of Justice, Éric Dupond-Moretti, “there are people whose lives we will save”: “We are far from the totalitarianism of 1984”, George Orwell’s novel, he assures. The presidential camp also highlights the “guarantees” provided.
Éric Dupond-Moretti compares this new possibility to the “old technique” of microphones or cameras placed in suspects’ homes. Another argument: the remote triggering of connected devices is already used by “intelligence services”, without the authorization of the judge, which will be essential here.
As for geolocation, it “already exists” with beacons and the demarcation of telephones for crimes and misdemeanors punishable by at least three years of imprisonment, insists the minister. But the “thugs” remove the beacons and putting them down is “dangerous” for the investigator, he continued.
Amendments from the left tried in vain to specify that journalists without press cards should also be protected, the minister deeming the precision superfluous.
The LFI group, opposed to the measure as such, however had bailiffs and notaries removed from the “protected” professions by amendment, considering that there was no valid reason for them to be so and not the rest. Population.
In this vast article 3 of the text are also provided for the extension of the use of night searches and the possibility of using a teleconsultation for a medical examination during an extension of police custody.
MPs from several opposition groups tried unsuccessfully to remove the possibility for a judge, under certain conditions, to place under house arrest with electronic monitoring a person who was released from pre-trial detention due to an error of procedure.
Today, only placement under judicial supervision is possible. “It’s an additional modality,” defended the minister. “Because of the lack of means of justice, would there be more errors (of procedures) which make you propose to cover up irregularities by making them regular? replied Communist MP Elsa Faucillon.