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The parquet is the office of the prosecution, in some countries, responsible for presenting legal cases at criminal trials against individuals or parties accused of breaking the law. [1]
The word literally means "wooden floor"; this is because, as opposed to the judges, who sit on an elevated platform during trials, the prosecution pleads standing on the floor. This also explains why the judges are sometimes referred to as "sitting magistrates" (magistrature assise) or "magistrates of the bench" (magistrats du siège) while the prosecutors are sometimes referred to as "standing magistrates" (magistrature debout).
In France, the parquet général is the public prosecutor's office of the appellate court ( cour d'appel ) or the Supreme Court ( Cour de Cassation ).
In Brazil, the prosecutor's office, the "Public Ministry" ( Ministério Público ), is metonymically referred to as the parquet.
In Romania, the prosecutor's office, the "Public Ministry" ( Ministerul Public ), is also called the parchet (pronounced [parˈket] ) and is allocated to a certain court at the local or national level.
In Dutch, the word parquet is translated as parket and it is also used to generally refer to the 'Public Ministry' ( Openbaar Ministerie ).
The Court of Cassation is the supreme court for civil and criminal cases in France. It is one of the country's four apex courts, along with the Council of State, the Constitutional Council and the Jurisdictional Disputes Tribunal.
A prosecutor is a legal representative of the prosecution in states with either the adversarial system, which is adopted in common law, or inquisitorial system, which is adopted in civil law. The prosecution is the legal party responsible for presenting the case in a criminal trial against the defendant, an individual accused of breaking the law. Typically, the prosecutor represents the state or the government in the case brought against the accused person.
In France, a cour d'assises, or Court of Assizes or Assize Court, is a criminal trial court with original and appellate limited jurisdiction to hear cases involving defendants accused of felonies, meaning crimes as defined in French law. It is the only French court that uses a jury trial.
The Outreau case refers to a criminal case of pedophilia which took place between 1997 and 2000 in Outreau in northern France and a partial judicial error which led to provisional detentions between 2001 and 2004. Following alerts launched by social services within the Delay family, a long investigation seemed to reveal an extensive pedophile network: around forty adults had been accused and around fifty children were potentially victims.
The Court of Cassation of Belgium is the supreme court of the Belgian judiciary. The court is composed of thirty judges with life tenure who are nominated by the High Council of Justice of Belgium and appointed by the Belgian federal government. The court handles cases in the two main languages of Belgium, Dutch and French, and provides certain facilities for cases in German. The court is assisted in its work by a public prosecutor's office and a bar association, which both function separately from other structures. The duty of the public prosecutor's office is to provide advisory opinions to the court on how the law ought to be interpreted and applied. The attorneys of the court's bar association assist litigants in proceedings before the court; in certain cases, their assistance is mandatory.
The courts of appeal are the main appellate courts in the judicial system of Belgium, which hear appeals against judgements of the tribunals of first instance, the enterprise tribunals and the presidents of those tribunals in their judicial area. There are five courts of appeal for each of the five judicial areas, which are the largest geographical subdivisions of Belgium for judicial purposes. The division of the Belgian territory into the five judicial areas is laid down in article 156 of the Belgian Constitution. A judicial area covers multiple judicial arrondissements ("districts"), except for the judicial area of Mons. Each arrondissement has a tribunal of first instance. Further below, an overview is provided of the five courts of appeal and the judicial arrondissements their judicial area covers. The courts of appeal do not hear appeals against judgements of the labour tribunals; these are heard by the courts of labour.
The Corte d'Assise is an Italian court composed of two professional, stipendiary judges or giudici togati; and six lay judges or giudici popolari, who are selected from the people. The Corte d'Assise has jurisdiction to try all crimes carrying a maximum penalty of 24 years in prison or more. These are the most serious crimes, such as terrorism and murder. Slavery, killing a consenting human being, and helping a person to commit suicide are also serious crimes that are tried by this court. Penalties imposed by the court can include life sentences. The Corte d'Assise does not preside over cases involving attempted murder.
The court of assizes is the trial court which tries the most serious crimes in the judicial system of Belgium. It is the highest Belgian court with criminal jurisdiction; as such, it is the only Belgian court that can sentence someone to life imprisonment. The courts of assizes are not permanent courts; a new court of assizes is assembled for each new trial. There is a court of assizes in each of the ten provinces of Belgium, as well as one in the arrondissement of Brussels-Capital which is not part of any province. Further below, an overview is provided of the eleven courts of assizes and their seats. They are the only courts in Belgium for which the provinces are used as territorial subdivisions. They are also the only courts in Belgium that hold jury trials. The jury acts as sole trier of fact, but decides on the penalty together with the judges. The trial by jury of certain crimes is laid down in article 150 of the Belgian Constitution. The Belgian courts of assizes have the same origin as their French namesakes.
An examining magistrate is a judge in an inquisitorial system of law who carries out pre-trial investigations into allegations of crime and in some cases makes a recommendation for prosecution. Also known as an investigating magistrate, inquisitorial magistrate, or investigating judge, the exact role and standing of examining magistrates varies by jurisdiction. Common duties and powers of the examining magistrate include overseeing ongoing criminal investigations, issuing search warrants, authorizing wiretaps, making decisions on pretrial detention, interrogating the accused person, questioning witnesses, examining evidence, as well as compiling a dossier of evidence in preparation for trial.
The French National School for the Judiciary is a French grande école, founded in 1958 by French President Charles de Gaulle and the father of the current French Constitution, Michel Debré, in order to encourage law students to embrace a judicial career. Originally referred to as the National Centre for Judicial Studies, it was renamed the French National School for the Judiciary in 1972.
In French law, the ministère public or le parquet is the authority charged with defending the interests of society and of the application of law. It is primarily made up of magistrates, but is sometimes represented by other persons such as police officials. Its magistrates can be referred to as "standing" magistrates, as opposed to magistrats du siège. Its closest equivalent in some English-speaking countries is the director of public prosecutions and the attorney general in others.
In France, a cour d’appel of the ordre judiciaire (judiciary) is a juridiction de droit commun du second degré, an appellate court of general jurisdiction. It reviews the judgments of a tribunal judiciaire. When one of the parties is not satisfied with the trial court’s judgment, the party can file an appeal. While decisions of a court of first instance are termed "jugements" in French, a court of appeals hands down an arrêt, which may either affirm or reverse the judgment of the court below. An arrêt (judgment) of the court of appeals may be further appealed en cassation. If the appeal is admissible at the cour de cassation, that court does not re-judge the facts of the matter a third time, but may investigate and verify whether the rules of law were properly applied by the lower courts.
In France, the correctional court is the court of first instance that has jurisdiction in criminal matters regarding offenses classified as délits committed by an adult. In 2013, French correctional courts rendered 576,859 judgments and pronounced 501,171 verdicts.
In France, a procureur général is a prosecutor at a court of appeal, at the Court of Cassation or the Court of Audit. In the case of the appellate courts, the term refers to the magistrate who conducts the prosecution for the court of appeal, as opposed to the judges.
The federal prosecutor's office of Belgium is a prosecutor's office with jurisdiction over the entire Belgian territory, unlike the other prosecutor's offices which are associated to a particular court or arrondissement. The office was created in 2002 to be able to act more efficiently against certain forms of crime that transcend the borders of individual judicial districts, such as human trafficking or terrorism. In this capacity, the office has the power to carry out prosecutions in all Belgian courts with criminal jurisdiction. The office fulfills its duties under the authority of the Minister of Justice, and is bound by the prosecutorial guidelines of the College of prosecutors-general.
Jean-François Ricard is a French magistrate, and since 25 June 2019 the first prosecutor of the National Terrorism Prosecution Office a parquet for the prosecution of terrorism in France.
A criminal proceeding in French law is one carried out in the name of society against a person accused of a criminal offense by applying the French penal code. It is taken in the name of society, in that its goal is to stop disruption of public order, and not to abate personal damages done to a specific person, which is governed by French civil law.
French criminal procedure focuses on how individuals accused of crimes are dealt with in the French criminal justice system: how people are investigated, prosecuted, tried, and punished for an infraction defined in the penal code. These procedural issues are codified in the French code of criminal procedure. It is the procedural arm of French criminal law.
This glossary of French criminal law is a list of explanations or translations of contemporary and historical concepts of criminal law in France.
In French criminal law, the investigation phase in a criminal proceeding is the procedure during which an investigating judge gathers evidence on the commission of an offense and decides whether to refer the persons charged to the trial court.
