VIDEO. "I won't shake your hand": Tensions at the Nanterre court between a lawyer and Gérald Darmanin

"Master, with all due respect, when you don't shake people's hands, it starts with disrespect, and it's a shame for your profession," replied Gérald Darmanin. "I'm not here to shake hands and validate your reforms, which will create difficulties for our professions and for those seeking justice," Camilla Quendolo immediately replied.

After the minister left, the lawyer answered questions from journalists present at the scene, returning to the facts. "I did not want to shake his hand because I believe that his policy and the way he conducts it is not politics and is something that simply leads to the desire to be elected. It is my conscience clause not to agree to shake his hand. However […] I note that when we had questions to ask him and things to say to him, he left."

In the lawyer's sights: the proposed reform of the judicial system . In this project, Gérald Darmanin wishes to return to the principle of mandatory adjustment of certain prison sentences, to reserve suspended sentences only for first-time offenders or to reinstate sentences of less than one month of imprisonment, which had been abolished in March 2020 during a previous sentencing reform. He also wants the guilty plea procedure, currently possible for certain offenses, to be extended to felonies, and wants to increase the number of criminal courts without juries, to reduce trial times.