A family member has been arrested in Paris: what to do

What does the call from the Paris police mean?

If you received that call, your relative almost certainly asked for it. As soon as a person is placed in garde à vue, the French form of police custody, they are informed of their rights in a language they understand, including the right to have a relative and their employer told and, for a foreign national, the consular authorities of their country (article 63-1 of the Code of Criminal Procedure). The person informed can be someone they live with, a parent, a child, a brother or a sister, or anyone else they name. The investigators must make that call within three hours of the request, unless an insurmountable circumstance is recorded in the file (article 63-2).

The call is usually short: the name of the unit, the city, sometimes the time of the arrest. The officers do not have to explain the case, and if you do not speak French the conversation may be very brief. Write down at once the name of the police station or unit, the number that appeared on your phone and the name of the person who spoke to you. Those details are what allow a lawyer in Paris to locate your relative within minutes. If nobody has called you, it does not mean nothing is happening: your relative may not have asked, or the prosecutor may have decided to delay the notice, or not to give it, where this is essential to gather or preserve evidence or to prevent serious harm to a person. Beyond forty-eight hours of custody, only a judge can keep that delay in place, and never for the consulate.

How can I appoint a lawyer for my relative from abroad?

This is the single most useful thing a family can do, and distance is no obstacle. Article 63-3-1 of the Code of Criminal Procedure allows the person who was informed of the custody to designate a lawyer. There is no form to fill in and no power of attorney to sign: the designation is a phone call. The one condition is that your relative confirms the choice when the officer puts it to them. The lawyer is then told the nature and the presumed date of the offence under investigation and must attend without undue delay. If the lawyer cannot be reached, or cannot come within two hours of being notified, the officer asks the Bar to appoint a duty lawyer.

Here is what happens when a family calls the firm from abroad on +33 1 87 66 00 48, whatever the time in Paris. Maître Bruguière asks for your relative's full name, date of birth and nationality, the police station or unit that called you, what you know of the circumstances, and a number where you can be reached, with your country code and your time zone. The firm then calls the police station to notify the designation and asks that it be put to your relative, travels there once the officer confirms that it has been accepted, and calls you back at a time that suits you. In Paris, most custodies take place in a district police station; some cases are handled by a specialised unit of the judicial police, where custody can be longer. The firm works in English with you and with your relative, which spares a second layer of interpretation during the confidential interview. How the lawyer intervenes from the first interview to the last is set out on the police custody lawyer in Paris page.

If your relative is a minor, the assistance of a lawyer is mandatory from the start of the measure and a parent can choose that lawyer. The rules specific to children, explained in French, are on the firm's page on garde à vue d'un mineur.

Should I contact the consulate, and will my relative have an interpreter?

A foreign national in custody can ask for the consular authorities of their country to be contacted (article 63-2 of the Code of Criminal Procedure). It is their right, not an automatic step, so it is worth making sure they asked. The law gives the consulate a protected position: the prosecutor can delay the notice to a relative to protect the investigation, but beyond forty-eight hours of custody that delay can no longer be maintained for the consulate, and the officer can no longer oppose a communication with it. You can also contact your embassy or consulate in Paris yourself. Consular staff do not act as lawyers and cannot take part in the defence, but they can follow the situation, help with documents and keep you informed; for a family several thousand kilometres away, they are often a useful second point of contact.

A person who does not understand French must be informed of their rights through an interpreter, where necessary after receiving a written form for immediate information (article 63-1), and the assistance of an interpreter is one of the rights notified at the start of the measure. In practice, the quality of that interpretation matters: a statement taken without a proper interpreter is examined closely by the defence.

What can the family do, and what can it not do?

The family has one right of its own that few people know about: asking for a doctor. When neither your relative, nor the prosecutor, nor the officer has asked for a medical examination, it is a right if a family member requests it (article 63-3 of the Code of Criminal Procedure). The doctor is appointed by the prosecutor or the officer, gives an opinion on whether the person is fit to remain in custody, and the certificate is placed in the file. It is the right reflex if your relative takes regular medication, has a chronic condition, or may have been injured during the arrest. If the examination is offered by video link during an extension, it requires your express agreement, since you made the request.

Speaking to your relative, on the other hand, is not a right of the family. It is the person in custody who can ask to communicate with a relative, in writing, by phone or in person. The officer allows it if the communication is compatible with the aims of the investigation, decides when and how it takes place, and it cannot last more than thirty minutes (article 63-2, II). Do not fly to Paris on the strength of the first call alone: custody is short, you would not be allowed to see your relative at the police station, and the useful work is done by the lawyer on site.

Two precautions apply in every case. Do not contact the other people involved or possible witnesses: preventing pressure on witnesses and collusion between suspects is one of the very grounds for custody (article 62-2), and an attempt to influence them can worsen your relative's position. And do not discuss the case on social media or by message: those exchanges can be seized and read.

What can the lawyer tell the family during custody?

Less than families expect, and it is better to know it from the start. The lawyer has a confidential interview with your relative, thirty minutes at most, which can be renewed at the start of an extension (article 63-4), may consult the record of the notification of rights, the medical certificate and the records of your relative's interviews, without taking a copy (article 63-4-1), and attends the interviews if your relative asked for it: they cannot then be heard on the facts without their lawyer, unless they expressly waive it (article 63-4-2).

For as long as custody lasts, however, the lawyer may not disclose to anyone, family included, what was said in those interviews or what they learned from the records and the questioning (article 63-4-4). That silence protects the defence; it is not a lack of consideration for you. What the lawyer can tell you is that they have seen your relative, whether custody continues or has been extended, and what is being prepared for the next step. The same rules, explained in French for families living in France, are on the firm's page proche en garde à vue.

How long can police custody last in France?

Garde à vue lasts twenty-four hours at most. The prosecutor can extend it once by twenty-four hours, by a written and reasoned authorisation, if the offence is a crime or a délit punishable by at least one year of imprisonment and the extension is the only way to achieve one of the aims of the investigation (article 63, II of the Code of Criminal Procedure). The clock starts when your relative was deprived of liberty, not when you were called (article 63, III), a point worth keeping in mind when you are counting hours across time zones.

For organised crime offences, including drug trafficking, two further extensions of twenty-four hours can be ordered by a judge, bringing custody to ninety-six hours (article 706-88). If your relative was invited to attend an interview rather than arrested, they are in a different framework, the audition libre (voluntary interview), and can leave at any time.

What happens when custody ends, and how can the family help?

At the end of the measure, on the prosecutor's instructions, your relative is either released or déféré, brought before the prosecutor (article 63-8 of the Code of Criminal Procedure). Release may be unconditional or come with a summons to a later hearing: before the criminal court, before a prosecutor's delegate, or for a guilty plea procedure.

A person who is déféré appears before the magistrate the same day (article 803-2). Where necessary, they can be held in secure premises at the court and presented the following day, at the latest twenty hours after custody ended, failing which they are released immediately (article 803-3). The prosecutor may then order a comparution immédiate (immediate trial), issue a summons, or refer the case to an investigating judge. In Paris, people brought before the prosecutor are taken to the tribunal judiciaire, Parvis Robert Badinter, at Porte de Clichy, described on the Paris Judicial Court page.

This is the moment when a family abroad can make a real difference. A person with no address in France is easily seen as someone who may not come back for the trial, and the court decides on that basis whether they can remain free. Within a few hours, send the lawyer by email scans of your relative's passport, proof of address in their home country, an employment contract or recent payslips, a student certificate, medical documents, and, if they live in France, their residence permit and lease. Documents in another language are easier for the court to read with a short French translation. If a judgment is given in your relative's presence, the deadline to appeal is ten days from the day it is pronounced (article 498), a short time for someone who has already left France.