Immediate appearance (comparution immédiate)

Immediate appearance is a mode of prosecution provided for by articles 393 and following of the Code of Criminal Procedure.

This is an emergency procedure, decided by the public prosecutor.

It intervenes in the continuity of a police custody measure. The defendant is thus transported directly from his place of police custody to the Criminal Court in order to be judged there.

Before the Criminal Court, the person concerned may decide to be tried on the spot.

He may also ask for a delay in order to prepare his defence. If he makes this request, which is by right, the hearing is postponed within a period which is - in principle - two to six weeks. The Correctional Court will then rule, pending this, on the security measures, i.e. it will decide whether to leave the defendant free, under judicial supervision, or place him in pre-trial detention.

This emergency procedure carries significant challenges.

The assistance of a lawyer is necessary, in order to detect possible procedural defects and to set up a strategic defense adapted to the situation of the person concerned.

Maître Maximilien FOURT appears very regularly before the Courts of Ile-De-France (Paris, Bobigny, Créteil, Nanterre, Pontoise, Versailles, Meaux...) but also throughout France.