OPINIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE FRENCH CGLPL 4/ There is an irrefutable fact. In general, the extremely dilapidated state of the prison facility is perfectly well known. At the end of 1991, the (European) Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) visited the institution and noted in its report that “detention conditions... left a lot to be desired” (§91) and that “accommodation conditions in wings A and B of the Marseille Baumettes prison were one of the immediate findings by the delegation”. The report underlined in particular that “the cells and their fittings were in an advanced stage of deterioration. A number of them were filthy, as was the bedding” (§92). It concluded, notably, that “to submit prisoners to such a combination of detention conditions constitutes, according to the CPT, nothing less than inhuman and degrading treatment”. On a follow-up visit in 1996, the Committee acknowledged that the authorities had carried out certain works, had reduced the prison’s population and had increased the frequency of showers, but insisted that the major renovation of the establishment should be given “top priority” (Report §93). A delegation from the Senate, visiting the prison on 18th April 2000, indicated that some one hundred cells were unoccupied “because of their squalid condition”, that wings A and B were dilapidated and that “several cells had open toilets”. Finally, the European Commissioner for Human Rights visited the establishment in September 2005 and stated that he “was shocked by the living conditions he observed (...) in the Baumettes prison”. “Holding prisoners in such an environment seems to me”, he added, “to be at the limit of acceptability and at the limit of human dignity”. 5/ Despite these regular observations made over the past twenty years, and despite the efforts of the establishment’s successive management teams, the Contrôle général is obliged to note that no substantial progress has been made. As an example, here is the description that two prisoners gave concerning their cell, a description that has been scrupulously verified by the Contrôle général: “absence of the upper part of the window; television cable severed (no plug); no lighting (missing bulb), no night-light for the night warder; no emergency inter-phone; WC recently installed but not fixed to the floor, almost non-existent toilet flush and no privacy, washbasin good but leaks from the U-bend; no mirror; refrigerator very dirty and infested with cockroaches both inside and outside; dirty, damaged walls covered in graffiti of all sorts, numerous spiders and lice; floor dirty, covered in rubbish, no shower cubicle or hot water; no cupboard or shelves, nothing on which to sit, no table”. Another person added: “it’s made to drive us insane”. Out of a sample of ninety-eight cells carefully examined by the inspectors, only 142