on request; these movements having to be accompanied by the prison staff. Furthermore, they have two eat their meals alone in their cells. This regime can however be adjusted, in particular by giving access to “opening of cell doors during a part of the day” and to free “movement of the person inside their accommodation unit during the hours of opening of cell doors”, while taking into account “the personality, health and dangerousness of the prisoner […] to support the latter’s efforts with regard to social rehabilitation by greater autonomy”. This provision brings the regime of long-term detention centres dangerously close to that of remand prisons by making the opening of doors an “adjustment”, dependent upon assessment of the person’s behaviour by the administration, contrary to the objectives assigned to long-term detention centres which, in accordance with article D .72 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, “comprise a regime principally oriented towards social rehabilitation and, if necessary, preparation of convicted prisoners for release”. Moreover, the managements of the institutions have chosen to assign buildings or different wings or even floors to the implementation of these regimes. Thus, the number of places devoted to the strictest regime varies from one prison to the next, ranging from 2% to more than 30%182. This difference, which is considerable, can but raise questions with regard to the criteria prevailing in the establishment of differentiated regimes. In addition, this steadiness in the numbers of prisoners assigned to the cells is not without posing difficulties with regard to implementation of the tailoring of regimes to prisoners’ needs. In the course of visits, the inspectors noted the existence of “waiting lists” in numerous institutions in order to move from the closed regime to the open regime, and vice versa, due to lack of available places. By setting up these sectors, the institutions also define a priori the number of prisoners whose behaviour should be considered incompatible with traditional open-door prison regimes. The note of 20th July 2009 states that assignment decisions come under the authority of the head of the institution “after the compulsory issuing of an opinion by the multidisciplinary committee” and specifies that assignment to the controlled regime “can only be decided for a set period” and that “the prisoner’s situation shall be re-examined at regular intervals”. Yet, this periodic and joint character of decision-making is not implemented in numerous penal institutions for convicted prisoners. Furthermore, it was noted that “closed door” cells were very often located on the ground floor (prisoners going up to different floors and regimes according to their “good” behaviour). Yet, this raises difficulties when the latter also accommodates cells for persons with restricted mobility (PMR/personnes à mobilité réduite)183. Indeed, the persons concerned may find themselves de facto under a “closed doors” regime and nevertheless remain isolated when they are granted the option of moving freely about their wing, contrary to the supposed objective of the “open” regime, aimed at involving the prisoner “in a process of socialisation, the principal features of which are autonomy and collective life”184. Although article 89 of the Prisons Act provides that “the placement of prisoners under a more severe prison regime cannot infringe the rights mentioned under article 22 of Prisons Act no. 2009-1436 of 24th of November 2009”185, itself worded in a vague manner mentioning respect for “rights” and the 182 From the examination of sixteen reports concerning long-term detention centres and "long-term detention centre" wings, it emerges that, at the time of the inspections, the proportion of places dedicated to the closed regime was under 10% in the case of six of the latter institutions, five had levels of between 10 and 20%, two of between 20 and 30% and three institutions had levels of over 30%. The highest level came to 37.56% of the places in a long-term detention centre wing in a prison of the DISP of Lille. 183 See in particular the section "Deprivation of Liberty and Access to Health Care” in the Annual Report for 2012 and in which the Contrôleur Général recommends in particular that "the specially-equipped cells should be judiciously distributed between the various wings, without placing them in wings with closed-door regimes.” 184 Prisons administration department circular of 20th July 2009 concerning the methods of implementation of differentiated regimes within prisons. 185 Article 22 of the Prisons Act specifies that "the prisons administration guarantees respect for their dignity and rights to all prisoners. The exercise thereof cannot be subject to any restrictions other than those resulting from the constraints inherent to imprisonment, maintenance of security and proper order within institutions, prevention of 119