No bail-out for Strauss-Kahn

The IMF boss and front-runner to be the French Socialist Party’s presidential candidate next year, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, has been refused bail by a court in New York, according to the BBC. As has been widely reported he’s facing a charge of attempted rape. It may be that the defence can appeal the decision on bail; […]

Legal advice at the police station – French and Scottish style

It used to be common in England to suggest that criminal justice was better in France or in Scotland. Well, each is another country, and they do things differently there. I’ve absolutely no doubt some of their laws are better. But as far as rights at the police station are concerned, they’re struggling to keep […]

France, the veil and freedom of religion

This week the French National Assembly has finally been debating the government’s proposed legislation banning the wearing of the “full face veil” – the niqab, burka or any other piece of clothing that hides the face. I wrote in January about the plans of Jean-François Copé and of President Nicolas Sarkozy. Well, in May the […]

It was only au revoir…

I’m glad to say Rachida Dati is in the news again on the other side of the water. The Telegraph reports a claim that Nicolas Sarkozy suspects her of being the source of the recent rumours about his marriage; Le Monde merely says Sarkozy was miffed that she popped up after the recent regional elections […]

Banning the burka in France

While the British government bans Islamist groups, it looks very much as though some kind of ban is going to be imposed in France on being completely veiled – wearing the niqab, chador and burka – in public. A committee of the National Assembly has been considering the current position since last summer, and there […]

Au revoir, Rachida…

Oh no! She’s going! Not quite yet, but the French justice minister Rachida Dati will leave Nicolas Sarkozy’s government in a matter of weeks in order to run in the European elections. She’s being reshuffled out, basically. Shame. She may be an aggro-magnet, but she’s been great fun right up to the end, coming back […]

Three legal stories from France

A hot week for legal news from France. First, if you remember the controversy over the annulment of the marriage of a couple from Lille – on the grounds that the wife had lied about being a virgin – then you’ll be interested that on Monday the Cour d’Appel in Douai reversed the ruling, saying […]

Le salaud lumineux

David Pannick’s Times column today is about the most famous French advocate of the age, Jacques Vergès, a repellent yet compelling figure whose political extremism and cynicism make radical British lawyers look like naive lackeys of the establishment. He first came to my attention when I was living in France in the mid-eighties and he […]

Beware of legal Francophilia

It’s a good story, and I agree with Simon Jenkins about the connected problems of police ineffectiveness and lack of traditional social restraints in Britain. No doubt the story is true, and perhaps things are better in France. But I’m always sceptical of this sort of thinking because a recurrent fancy of British writers about […]

More trouble in France

The other French story concerns Sarko’s legal axewoman Rachida Dati, the very sexy but somewhat dangerous minister of justice. She’s got herself into trouble by initially defending the judgment of a court in Lille, which granted annulment of a marriage on the basis that the wife, who had claimed to be a virgin, had lied. […]