The Court of Cassation has decided to transmit to the Constitutional Council the priority question of constitutionality (QPC) raised by the Keeper of the Seals within the framework of the procedure initiated against him by the Court of Justice of the Republic for “illegal taken of interest “.
by Abel Mestre
This is a first victory for Eric Dupond-Moretti in the battle against the procedure initiated against him by the Court of Justice of the Republic (CJR) for “illegal taking of interests”. The Court of Cassation decided, Friday, February 17, to transmit to the Constitutional Council the priority question of constitutionality (QPC) raised on February 3 through its lawyer, Patrice Spinosi. She considers that this QPC, “which argues that the legislator did not specify under the law the conditions under which a judge can carry out a search within a ministry, presents an institutional issue with regard to the principle of separation of powers , as soon as a ministry is a place of exercise of government action. “
The procedure initiated by Eric Dupond-Moretti came in support of his request for cancellation of the search of 1 er July 2021. That day, for fifteen hours, magistrates of the CJR – Special jurisdiction responsible for judging the ministers for the crimes committed in the exercise of their functions -, accompanied by around twenty gendarmes in the Paris research section, presented themselves at the start of the morning Place Vendôme to search the ministry . The Minister of Justice is accused of having, a few weeks after his appointment, ordered the General Inspectorate of Justice of Administrative Investigations, a step prior to disciplinary procedure, against magistrates with whom he had been in opposition as that lawyer.
On February 3, before the plenary assembly of the Court of Cassation, his most solemn training, the object of the debates was not to decide on the merits of the search of 2021, nor to know If this measure was, or not, disproportionate. The point of law raised by M e spinosi was to determine whether a search in a ministry, the place of exercise of executive power, did not contravene the separation of powers, a constitutional principle. Likewise, it was a question of knowing whether the legislator had not overlooked his office by not providing specific measures framing the searches in the ministries.
“A new disavowal for the CJR”
The unprecedented articulation of these two grievances, suffering from the separation of powers and negative incompetence of the legislator, was the heart of the reflection of M e spinosi. And this is what won the decision of the Court of Cassation, which considers that “the question asked is new and, consequently, decides to transmit it to the Constitutional Council”.
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