A police crackdown that aims to clear a poor suburb of petty crime and street vendors before the Paris 2024 Olympics is putting pressure on an overcrowded prison operating at almost double its capacity.
Villepinte is a grey, concrete detention centre in the suburb of Seine-Saint Denis. It lies 2.5 km from the Paris Arena Nord, set to host boxing and fencing competitions during the Games beginning on July 26.
It is among the most crowded prisons in France. Opened in 1991, Villepinte takes prisoners from the busy Bobigny courthouse nearby for pre-trial detention and short sentences.
“The penitentiary authority needs to prepare for the worst,” Eric Mathais, chief prosecutor at Bobigny, said in an interview.
Reducing inmate numbers ahead of the Olympics is unrealistic, Mathais said.
“We need to limit the number of people being imprisoned, but this is easier said than done as I am under extreme pressure from everyone to be clearly more repressive.”
Prosecutors, judges, lawyers and clerks working in Bobigny court were interviewed and said that the Seine-Saint-Denis justice system was operating at the limits of its capacity and prosecuting increasingly minor infractions in preparation for the Games.
Many of the Olympic events are being held in Seine-Saint-Denis. The region has the highest ratio of immigrants among France’s departments and is also the poorest.
Teachers have been on strike since February, saying schools in the area are under-resourced. Homeless and traveller populations have set up camps and squats in the departments.
In some neighbourhoods, informal sellers line the streets.
Mohamed Gnabaly, mayor of Ile Saint Denis, a town in the area, said the Olympics had helped infrastructure and housing development delayed for years due to lack of investment.
However, Olivier Cahn, a sociologist at CESDIP, a French centre for research on law and prisons, said a reliance on policing and tough sentencing was disproportionately affecting the poor, migrant and homeless populations.
“All we have are short-term solutions,” said Cahn.
A zero-tolerance policing initiative launched last year that targets street crimes such as drug dealing and unlicensed selling in the area was adding to the prison population, prosecutor Mathais said.
Police deployed 4,000 extra officers in March and April, Seine-Saint-Denis police director of local security Michel Lavaud told reporters last week, calling it a clean up and saying the operation provided safety for locals and “tourists, audiences, the families of the athletes.”
“It is just the beginning, we are going to increase the intensity” ahead of the Games, Lavaud said.
The crackdown drew criticism from seven legal professionals Reuters spoke to.
Fouad Qnia, a defence lawyer at Bobigny, said heavy penalties for infractions such as unlicensed street selling were disproportionate and could further marginalise people in already vulnerable situations.
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