It is a Saturday night in September in a small market town in the Dordogne. Paul, a 58-year-old retired teacher from Yorkshire who has owned a stone house there for nine years, is at the village f\u00eate with neighbours. An argument over a parked car turns physical. Somebody shoves somebody, a table goes over, and within minutes two gendarmes arrive with blue lights reflecting off the shuttered mairie. Paul’s French, perfectly adequate for ordering at the boulangerie, collapses under stress. He is handcuffed, driven to the brigade, and told he is placed en garde \u00e0 vue, the French form of police custody. He spends the night in a cell asking himself the same questions any Briton would ask: how long can they keep me here, can I call my wife, can I see a lawyer who speaks English, will an interpreter be provided, and will any of this affect my right to go on living in France after Brexit?<\/p>\n
This guide answers those questions in the order they arise. French police custody is a tightly framed measure: it can last twenty-four hours, renewable once, it is ordered by a judicial police officer under the supervision of the public prosecutor, and your rights must be notified to you immediately in a language you understand, with an interpreter where needed, a lawyer, a doctor, and, because you are a foreign national, contact with the British consulate. Where those safeguards are ignored, the custody and what follows it can be annulled by the courts. The procedure below is the same whether you live in France year-round on a Withdrawal Agreement residence permit or you are here for a fortnight in your second home; only the consequences for your residence differ, and the final section explains how to protect it.<\/p>\n
A garde \u00e0 vue, which literally means being kept within sight, is the French mechanism by which investigators hold a suspect at their disposal while they carry out urgent enquiries. It is not an informal chat at the station and it is not a punishment; it is a coercive measure decided by an officier de police judiciaire, a judicial police officer, under the control of the judicial authority. Article 62-2 of the Code of criminal procedure<\/a> defines it in these terms: “La garde \u00e0 vue est une mesure de contrainte d\u00e9cid\u00e9e par un officier de police judiciaire, sous le contr\u00f4le de l’autorit\u00e9 judiciaire, par laquelle une personne \u00e0 l’encontre de laquelle il existe une ou plusieurs raisons plausibles de soup\u00e7onner qu’elle a commis ou tent\u00e9 de commettre un crime ou un d\u00e9lit puni d’une peine d’emprisonnement est maintenue \u00e0 la disposition des enqu\u00eateurs.” In plain English, the police need one or more plausible reasons to suspect you of a crime or an imprisonable offence, and custody must be the only way to achieve at least one of six aims exhaustively listed by the same article: carrying out enquiries that require your presence, bringing you before the public prosecutor so that magistrate can decide what happens next, stopping you from altering evidence, stopping you from pressuring witnesses or victims and their families, stopping you from conferring with possible accomplices, or putting an end to the offence. If none of those aims genuinely requires your detention, custody is unlawful from the start, and your avocat, your French lawyer, can say so on the record.<\/p>\n From the very beginning of the measure, the judicial police officer must inform the procureur de la R\u00e9publique, the public prosecutor, of your custody by any means, telling that magistrate why custody was ordered and what offence label was notified to you. The prosecutor can change that legal characterisation, in which case the new label must be notified to you again under the same formal conditions. This supervision matters because it is the prosecutor, and nobody else, who can extend custody beyond the first period. Article 63 of the Code of criminal procedure<\/a> states the time limit bluntly: “La dur\u00e9e de la garde \u00e0 vue ne peut exc\u00e9der vingt-quatre heures.” Custody cannot exceed twenty-four hours. A single extension of up to twenty-four more hours is possible, but only on the written and reasoned authorisation of the prosecutor, only where the suspected offence is a crime or a d\u00e9lit, a mid-level offence, punishable by at least one year of imprisonment, and only where the extension remains the sole means of achieving one of the six aims or of bringing you before a judge where the court has no suitable holding rooms. The prosecutor may make authorisation conditional on you being brought before him or her, in person or by live video link. Any earlier deprivation of liberty for the same facts counts towards the clock: if you were apprehended or restrained before formal custody began, the start time is pushed back to the moment you actually lost your freedom, and a statement taken immediately before custody can shift the start time too. For Paul, arrested at half past eleven at night, this means the twenty-four hours run from the roadside stop, not from when the paperwork catches up at the station.<\/p>\n At the end of the period the police must either release you or bring you before the magistrate, who then decides the next step: dropping the case, summoning you to court at a later date, or ordering immediate trial or a judicial investigation. What the police cannot do is hold you for a second night on their own authority, invent a fresh custody for the same facts to reset the clock, or keep you waiting while they finish unrelated checks. Brexit changed nothing about these time limits: a British passport gives you exactly the same custody rights as a French identity card. Where your British nationality changes the picture is in the rights you must be told about, and in what a conviction can later do to your residence, which is the subject of the following sections.<\/p>\n The notification of rights is the heart of French custody law, and the courts treat it as a substantive formality, not a box-ticking exercise. Article 63-1 of the Code of criminal procedure<\/a> provides: “La personne plac\u00e9e en garde \u00e0 vue est imm\u00e9diatement inform\u00e9e par un officier de police judiciaire ou, sous le contr\u00f4le de celui-ci, par un agent de police judiciaire, dans une langue qu’elle comprend, le cas \u00e9ch\u00e9ant au moyen du formulaire pr\u00e9vu au treizi\u00e8me alin\u00e9a”. You must be told immediately, in a language you understand, if necessary using a standard written form. The same article continues with the decisive sentence for a Briton whose French is shaky: “Si la personne ne comprend pas le fran\u00e7ais, ses droits doivent lui \u00eatre notifi\u00e9s par un interpr\u00e8te, le cas \u00e9ch\u00e9ant apr\u00e8s qu’un formulaire lui a \u00e9t\u00e9 remis pour son information imm\u00e9diate.” If you do not understand French, your rights must be notified to you through an interpreter, after a form has been handed to you if needed for immediate information. A form alone, pressed into your hand while officers carry on in rapid French, does not satisfy the requirement where you plainly need a human interpreter; as a recent Paris ruling examined below confirms, the interpreter must be there from the notification itself, not merely from the first formal interview.<\/p>\n The content of that notification is fixed by law and it is long, which is precisely why the interpreter matters. You must be told of the custody itself, how long it can last, and that it can be extended; of the suspected offence with its legal label, date, place, and which of the six statutory grounds justifies holding you; and then of each attached right. Those rights are: having a relative, your employer, or any person of your choice informed, and communicating with them; being examined by a doctor; being assisted by a lawyer; being assisted by an interpreter where needed; consulting the custody and rights notification record, the medical certificate, and your interview records promptly and no later than before any extension; submitting observations to the prosecutor, or to the liberty and custody judge, when that magistrate rules on extension, orally recorded if you are not brought before the magistrate; and, during interviews, after stating your identity, making statements, answering questions, or remaining silent. The silence point deserves emphasis for British readers used to the English caution: in France you have an express statutory right to stay silent in custody, and officers must tell you so.<\/p>\n Because you are a foreign national, two of these rights carry extra weight. First, the consular right. Article 63-2 of the Code of criminal procedure<\/a> states: “Lorsque la personne gard\u00e9e \u00e0 vue est de nationalit\u00e9 \u00e9trang\u00e8re, elle peut faire contacter les autorit\u00e9s consulaires de son pays.” Where the person in custody is a foreign national, the consular authorities of his or her country may be contacted at his or her request. Investigators must act within three hours of your request unless genuinely insurmountable circumstances are recorded, and the prosecutor can only delay or withhold notification to family or employer, never to the consulate at the extended stage, where secrecy is indispensable to preserve evidence or protect life and limb. Keep your expectations realistic, though. The British government’s published information pack for British nationals arrested or detained in France<\/a> warns in its opening chapter that, where a Briton is arrested or detained abroad, consular staff will do what they can to help, but cannot interfere with the local justice system, secure release, or pay for services such as a lawyer. What consular staff can do is contact you once notified, give you a list of local English-speaking lawyers and interpreters, explain the local system including legal aid, visit or telephone you, pass on messages and money from family, and in some cases help you apply for a transfer to a British prison. They cannot secure your release, arrange special treatment because you are British, give legal advice, or pay your bills. Ask for the consulate to be contacted, take the list of lawyers, and instruct your own avocat without delay.<\/p>\n Second, the lawyer and the doctor. Article 63-3-1 of the Code of criminal procedure<\/a> provides: “D\u00e8s le d\u00e9but de la garde \u00e0 vue et \u00e0 tout moment au cours de celle-ci, la personne peut demander \u00e0 \u00eatre assist\u00e9e par un avocat d\u00e9sign\u00e9 par elle ou commis d’office.” From the start of custody and at any moment during it, you may ask to be assisted by a lawyer of your choice or a duty lawyer appointed by the head of the local Bar, the b\u00e2tonnier. The designated lawyer must be told the suspected offence and its date, must come without undue delay, and if he or she cannot be reached or cannot attend within two hours, a duty lawyer is appointed immediately. Article 63-4 of the Code of criminal procedure<\/a> adds: “L’avocat d\u00e9sign\u00e9 dans les conditions pr\u00e9vues \u00e0 l’article 63-3-1 peut communiquer avec la personne gard\u00e9e \u00e0 vue dans des conditions qui garantissent la confidentialit\u00e9 de l’entretien. La dur\u00e9e de l’entretien ne peut exc\u00e9der trente minutes.” The lawyer meets you in strict confidence for up to thirty minutes, again from the start of any extension, attends every interview and any reconstruction or identification parade, may ask questions at the end of each interview, and may file written observations that join the case file. Immediate questioning without waiting for the lawyer is allowed only on written prosecutorial authorisation for narrow investigative reasons. The official service-public.fr page on garde \u00e0 vue<\/a> summarises the same position for the public: the person in custody may request a lawyer from the start and at any point, must otherwise be heard in the lawyer’s presence unless he or she waives that right, and the lawyer may consult the custody, medical, interview and confrontation records. The consultation right is mirrored in the statute itself. Article 63-4-1 of the Code of criminal procedure<\/a> states: “A sa demande, l’avocat peut consulter le proc\u00e8s-verbal \u00e9tabli en application de l’avant-dernier alin\u00e9a de l’article 63-1 constatant la notification du placement en garde \u00e0 vue et des droits y \u00e9tant attach\u00e9s, le certificat m\u00e9dical \u00e9tabli en application de l’article 63-3, ainsi que les proc\u00e8s-verbaux d’audition de la personne qu’il assiste.” You yourself may consult those documents or a copy of them, and no later than before a possible extension. As for the doctor, Article 63-3 of the Code of criminal procedure<\/a> provides: “Toute personne plac\u00e9e en garde \u00e0 vue peut, \u00e0 sa demande, \u00eatre examin\u00e9e par un m\u00e9decin d\u00e9sign\u00e9 par le procureur de la R\u00e9publique ou l’officier de police judiciaire.” Anyone in custody may on request be examined by a doctor appointed by the prosecutor or the officer, a second time if custody is extended, with the doctor ruling on fitness for continued custody and recording all useful findings in a certificate placed in the file; a relative may also request the examination. If you take medication, have a heart condition, or were injured in the arrest, ask for the doctor at once and mention the interpreter so the consultation is effective.<\/p>\n A flawed custody is not a mere technicality in French law. Breaches of the safeguards described above can lead the courts to annul the custody and the acts that flow from it, typically the interviews conducted while the breach persisted. The test applied by the courts turns on whether the irregularity caused you substantial harm, une atteinte substantielle, to your rights, and three recent decisions show exactly where that line falls. They are worth reading closely, because each corresponds to a mistake British detainees commonly suffer: no interpreter at notification, late notification, and a chosen lawyer who is never properly contacted.<\/p>\n The interpreter case is the most directly useful. On 8 April 2025 the Paris Court of Appeal, ruling on a custody that preceded administrative detention in case RG No 25\/01888, dealt with a foreign national whose rights had been notified at 9.45 pm without an Arabic interpreter, with a second notification minutes later still without one, and an interpreter requisitioned only at 10.50 pm before the first interview. The court held, in reasoning every British reader should memorise: “il r\u00e9sulte que l’assistance d’un interpr\u00e8te \u00e9tait n\u00e9cessaire d\u00e8s la notification des droits en garde-\u00e0-vue et que l’absence d’interpr\u00e8te a caus\u00e9 une atteinte substantielle aux droits de l’int\u00e9ress\u00e9 eu \u00e9gard au nombre d’explications fournies \u00e0 cette occasion et aux divers droits dont l’exercice est possible au cours de cette garde-\u00e0-vue.” The assistance of an interpreter was necessary from the notification of rights itself, and its absence substantially harmed the person’s rights given the volume of explanations delivered at that point and the range of rights exercisable during custody. The full decision is published at Paris Court of Appeal, 8 April 2025, RG No 25\/01888<\/a>. Nothing in the file supported the suggestion that the later interpreter had been a mere comfort for someone who read and spoke French. The practical lesson is immediate: if your rights are notified in French you do not properly understand, say so at once, ask for an interpreter to be recorded as necessary, and refuse to sign any acknowledgement suggesting you read the record yourself. The acknowledgement signed without an interpreter became, in this case, evidence of the breach rather than proof of understanding.<\/p>\n The delay case sets the second boundary. On 26 February 2025 the Criminal Chamber of the Court of Cassation, the cour de cassation, France’s supreme court for criminal matters, quashed a Lyon appeal ruling in case No 24-82.146, published at Court of Cassation, Criminal Chamber, 26 February 2025, No 24-82.146<\/a>. The suspect had been arrested at home at 9.48 am, placed in custody, subjected to a house search until 10.15 am, notified of his rights at the station at 10.30 am, with the prosecutor informed at 10.35 am. The appeal court had found those delays unexceptional. The supreme court disagreed, recalling first that “l’officier de police judiciaire, qui, pour les n\u00e9cessit\u00e9s de l’enqu\u00eate, place une personne en garde \u00e0 vue, doit en aviser le procureur de la R\u00e9publique d\u00e8s le d\u00e9but de cette mesure”, the officer who places a person in custody must inform the prosecutor from the start of the measure, and that “la personne plac\u00e9e en garde \u00e0 vue est imm\u00e9diatement inform\u00e9e, par l’officier de police judiciaire, de ses droits”, the person in custody is immediately informed of his or her rights. It then held: “alors qu’aucun \u00e9l\u00e9ment de la proc\u00e9dure n’\u00e9tablit une circonstance insurmontable justifiant la d\u00e9cision de diff\u00e9rer jusqu’\u00e0 quarante-deux minutes la notification des droits, et \u00e0 quarante-sept minutes l’information du procureur de la R\u00e9publique, la cour d’appel a m\u00e9connu le sens et la port\u00e9e des textes susvis\u00e9s.” With nothing in the file establishing genuinely insurmountable circumstances, deferring notification by forty-two minutes and information of the prosecutor by forty-seven minutes violated the cited articles, and the conviction built on that custody fell. A house search in your presence does not justify postponing either formality. For a Briton, the point is that even short delays count: note the exact times on every document you sign, and have your avocat compare them with the custody start time.<\/p>\n The lawyer case draws the third line, this time in favour of the prosecution, and it teaches a defensive lesson. On 6 May 2025 the Criminal Chamber ruled in case No 24-86.191, published at Court of Cassation, Criminal Chamber, 6 May 2025, No 24-86.191<\/a>, on a suspect who had named his chosen lawyer at 2.40 pm on the first day and renewed the request at extension, where the appeal court had annulled custody because no later record showed the lawyer being contacted or an interview taking place. The supreme court quashed that annulment, holding: “l’officier de police judiciaire \u00e9tablit un proc\u00e8s-verbal r\u00e9capitulatif de fin de garde \u00e0 vue mentionnant les informations donn\u00e9es et les demandes faites en application des articles 63-2 \u00e0 63-3-1 du code de proc\u00e9dure p\u00e9nale et les suites qui leur ont \u00e9t\u00e9 r\u00e9serv\u00e9es, sans qu’il soit n\u00e9cessaire de dresser un proc\u00e8s-verbal pour chacune des diligences accomplies pour l’exercice de ces droits.” The officer draws up a single closing summary record mentioning the information given, the requests made under the custody-rights articles, and what became of them, with no need for a separate record for each step. Because that closing record did describe the steps taken to bring in the chosen lawyer, the annulment was overturned and the case sent back. The principle cuts both ways and your avocat knows how to use it: where the closing record is silent or vague about contacting your lawyer, the breach argument is strong; where it carefully logs each call and outcome, challenging on that ground alone will fail and effort is better spent on the interpreter or timing points. In every case, raise custody complaints at the earliest opportunity through your lawyer, at the first hearing before the trial court or the investigating chamber, with the custody records and the closing summary in hand, because a court cannot assess what it cannot see.<\/p>\n For a British resident, the custody itself is only half the danger; the other half is what a conviction can do to your right to stay. Since the end of free movement, Britons in France are third-country nationals. A short suspended sentence for a f\u00eate fight will not automatically remove a long-settled neighbour, but the criminal courts hold a specific weapon that can: the interdiction du territoire fran\u00e7ais, the ban from French territory. Article 131-30 of the Criminal Code<\/a> provides: “La peine d’interdiction du territoire fran\u00e7ais peut \u00eatre prononc\u00e9e, \u00e0 titre d\u00e9finitif ou pour une dur\u00e9e de dix ans au plus, \u00e0 l’encontre de tout \u00e9tranger coupable d’un crime, d’un d\u00e9lit puni d’une peine d’emprisonnement d’une dur\u00e9e sup\u00e9rieure ou \u00e9gale \u00e0 trois ans ou d’un d\u00e9lit pour lequel la peine d’interdiction du territoire fran\u00e7ais est pr\u00e9vue par la loi.” The ban may be imposed definitively or for up to ten years on any foreigner guilty of a crime, an offence punishable by at least three years’ imprisonment, or an offence for which the statute expressly provides it. The court must weigh how long you have lived in France and the nature, age and intensity of your ties here before imposing it, a point worth evidencing with tax notices, school certificates, medical records and proof of community life. Once imposed, the ban entails removal from the border as of right, where relevant at the end of any prison term; served alongside unsuspended imprisonment, its execution is suspended during detention and resumes on release; and its duration runs from the date you actually left France, established under conditions set by decree in the Council of State. In short, it is the sentence that can undo a decade of French life, including for a Withdrawal Agreement permit holder whose right to reside presupposes compliance with the conditions of stay.<\/p>\n Two features of that regime catch convicted Britons by surprise, and a very recent supreme court decision illustrates the first. Relief from the ban, the rel\u00e8vement, is available only where the ban was imposed as an ancillary penalty, not as the main sentence. On 3 September 2025 the Criminal Chamber ruled in case No 25-80.755, published at Court of Cassation, Criminal Chamber, 3 September 2025, No 25-80.755<\/a>: “Il r\u00e9sulte du second de ces textes que seule une personne frapp\u00e9e d’une interdiction, d\u00e9ch\u00e9ance ou incapacit\u00e9 prononc\u00e9e \u00e0 titre de peine compl\u00e9mentaire peut en solliciter le rel\u00e8vement, cette facult\u00e9 n’\u00e9tant pas ouverte lorsque une telle mesure est prononc\u00e9e \u00e0 titre de peine principale.” Only a person subject to a ban, forfeiture or incapacity imposed as an ancillary penalty may seek relief; the route is closed where the measure was the principal sentence. The applicant, married to a French national with a French child, had invoked family life and the passage of eleven years since the sentence; the court held that the right to an effective remedy protects only those with an arguable claim to a Convention right, which he had not shown. Read your judgment with your avocat the day you receive it: if a territorial ban appears, identify whether it is principal or ancillary, diary the relief route accordingly, and assemble the family-life evidence early rather than a decade later.<\/p>\n The second surprise is timing. An appeal against a criminal judgment given adversarially must be lodged fast. Article 498 of the Code of criminal procedure<\/a> states: “l’appel est interjet\u00e9 dans le d\u00e9lai de dix jours \u00e0 compter du prononc\u00e9 du jugement contradictoire.” Appeal is lodged within ten days of delivery of an adversarial judgment, with the clock running from service where you were absent or unrepresented. Ten days leaves no room for a relaxed return to the United Kingdom to think things over. Have the judgment translated by a sworn translator, check whether any territorial ban, suspended sentence, fine or compensation order appears, and instruct your avocat on appeal within days, not weeks. The same urgency applies to residence paperwork: keep your Withdrawal Agreement card, passport stamps, tax assessments and proof of address in one file, tell your avocat your exact residence status before any hearing so ties to France are pleaded against a ban, and take advice before any planned departure, since leaving without the proper recorded formalities can complicate both the ban’s timetable and later re-entry. Visitors in second homes face the mirror risk: a ban served at the border ends the back-and-forth life entirely.<\/p>\n Paul, our Yorkshire neighbour from the opening scene, was released the next morning without charge after the gendarmerie reviewed the CCTV from the f\u00eate, and his weekend ended with nothing worse than a sleepless night and a story for the pub. It could easily have gone further, and the structure of French law is what keeps the further stages honest. Custody is confined to twenty-four hours plus one reasoned extension, the prosecutor supervises from the first minute, and your rights must reach you immediately in English or through an interpreter, with a lawyer, a doctor and the consulate within call. Where the police fall short, the courts have shown in 2025 that they annul: no interpreter from notification, no valid custody; no insurmountable reason for delay, no valid custody; a chosen lawyer ignored without trace in the closing record, a live nullity argument. A conviction, in turn, must be read the day it arrives for any territorial ban, its principal or ancillary character, and the ten-day appeal window. Brexit made you a foreign national in French police stations, but it left the safeguards intact and gave you the consulate as an extra telephone number. Use each of them early, through an avocat, and in writing on the record.<\/p>\n For a telephone consultation within 48 hours with an avocat of the firm, call +33 6 46 60 58 22<\/a> (Ma\u00eetre Reda Kohen). You can also reach us through the contact page<\/a> with a short summary of the arrest, the town and date concerned, and any custody record or court summons already received.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Arrested in France as a Briton? Time limits, interpreter, lawyer, consulate and how to challenge an unlawful garde a vue.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":251031309,"featured_media":16553,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_kj_source_type":"","_kj_official_id":"","_kj_official_url":"","_kj_judilibre_id":"","_kj_jur":"","_kj_lieu":"","_kj_chambre":"","_kj_rg":"","_kj_date":"","activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":4,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"federated","footnotes":""},"categories":[80312,80314],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2124624","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-british-desk","category-decryptage"],"yoast_head":"\nB. Which rights must the police notify immediately when you do not speak French?<\/h3>\n
II. After the custody ends: how do you challenge an unlawful garde \u00e0 vue and protect your residence?<\/h2>\n
A. How do you get a garde \u00e0 vue annulled for a missing interpreter or a late lawyer?<\/h3>\n
B. Can a French conviction force you out of France, and how do you appeal in time?<\/h3>\n
Conclusion<\/h2>\n
Need a quick opinion on your case.<\/h2>\n