This Tuesday, the Senate Commission of Inquiry confirms the scale of drug trafficking in France. To further strengthen the fight against this scourge, the executive proposed the creation of an anti-narcotics prosecution and a “French-style DEA”, in reference to the Drug Enforcement Administration, the government anti-drug agency. drugs in the United States.
A clear senatorial report: drug trafficking is spreading across the entire territory in a “start-up nation” or “Uberization” way, quickly and increasingly accessible through current technologies. Even with rebound zones in the Antilles and an outbreak of violence linked to competition between criminal organizations, “We are not yet a narco-State”, tempers the president of the commission of inquiry Jérôme Durain (PS).
An underestimated drug trade
The members of the commission, however, criticized the management of the executive, which according to them did not take the right measure of drug trafficking, particularly in the anti-drug plan that the government must present soon.
“He was judged to be starving, destitute. This seems to indicate that the issue of drug trafficking has not been adequately judged by the executive,” said rapporteur Etienne Blanc (LR). “The magistrates explained that the complexity of the code of criminal procedure presented a certain number of flaws which brought down an entire procedure,” underlined Étienne Blanc, also evoking the “glaring lack of human, technical and legal resources”.
Our file on drug trafficking
Creation of a national anti-narcotics prosecutor’s office
Consequently, the senators propose a series of recommendations commensurate with their findings. Among them, the possibility of facilitating the use of “repentants”, or even a “safe” file within the criminal procedure, which would contain elements on the techniques used by the police not disclosed to the defense. Furthermore, the members of the commission expressed the wish to facilitate the use of special investigation techniques.
Finally, the senators recommend the creation of a dedicated public prosecutor’s office: “We propose the creation of a national anti-narcotics prosecutor’s office (Pnast), based on the model of the PNF (financial prosecutor’s office) or the Pnat (anti-terrorist prosecutor’s office), which will make it possible to specialize and embody the fight against drug trafficking, with the competence to focus on the highest end of the spectrum,” explained Jérôme Durain.