France’s prison system is bursting at the seams, and a new government-commissioned report isn’t mincing words. A coalition of judges, lawyers, and prison officials has sounded the alarm over soaring inmate numbers, calling for what they describe as a “drastic emergency measure”—a sweeping reduction in sentences for all inmates, regardless of their crimes. And that’s where the real uproar begins.
The report, finally made public by Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin after being ordered by his predecessor Didier Migaud, lays bare the numbers: as of April 1, 2025, France had packed 82,921 people into facilities designed to hold just 62,358. That’s a crushing 133% occupancy rate. For the authors, there’s no time to waste. Their proposed fix? Shorten sentences across the board.
But critics say this so-called solution is nothing more than opening the floodgates—and letting danger walk free. Pierre-Marie Sève, director of the Institute for Justice, warns that history doesn’t bode well for such leniency. France has tried this road before—in 1981, 1988, and again during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Every time, crime shot up shortly afterward.
Worse yet, some in the field want to make sentence reductions automatic once overcrowding hits a certain level. The signal that sends, say critics, is loud and clear: prison time is negotiable, and crime just might pay if you wait long enough.
Darmanin isn’t buying it. He’s slammed the proposal, as has Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau. With public opinion already fuming over perceived judicial softness, cutting sentences now could be political suicide.
So what’s the alternative? For starters, building more prisons—something governments have long promised, but rarely delivered. Darmanin now backs a faster, more affordable fix: factory-built prisons, modeled after British and German initiatives. These prefabricated facilities, he says, can slash costs in half and be ready by 2027. The target? 3,000 new cells.
Another option, Sève argues, is restoring a justice system that actually deters. Right now, many sentences are only partly served, and for too many offenders, that’s a gamble worth taking. A tougher, no-nonsense approach could stop the revolving door.
There’s also the elephant in the room—foreign inmates. They make up roughly 25% of France’s prison population, yet calls to automatically deport non-citizen convicts have largely gone nowhere. The Institute for Justice says it’s time to write that policy into law and make deportation a given for all eligible crimes.
France’s prison dilemma isn’t new, but this latest debate has put it front and center. Whether the government sticks to its guns or bends under pressure remains to be seen. But one thing’s clear: simply throwing open the cell doors isn’t the answer the public—or the country’s security—wants to hear.
