The information is given directly and immediately or, in the case of hospitalised patients, as quickly as possible”229. Indeed, patients who arrive in a state of crisis in emergency psychiatric wards, for example, are not in a condition permitting their immediate notification. In this case priority is given to treatment and the notification is carried out within 24 or 48 hours. The person is only informed if their condition makes this usefully possible, that is to say if they are capable of discernment and of expressing their wishes. In practice, the inspectors have sometimes wondered about the discernment of certain patients admitted to psychiatric care with their consent, upon whom detention is in reality imposed and who, due to their status as freely-hospitalised patients, do not have the benefit of information as comprehensive as that issued to patients committed to psychiatric care without their consent. 1.1.2 The information is shared with a third party in certain specific cases In certain cases, third parties are also notified of the rights of persons deprived of liberty at the same time as the person concerned, in order to enable use of this information to assert the rights of persons not able to do so. 1.1.2.1Third Parties who must be informed when persons are placed in Police Custody Notification of a close relation The law provides that persons placed in police custody may request the issuing of notification of this measure by telephone to a person with whom they usually live, a blood relation, one of their brothers and sisters or their conservator or guardian 230. In practice, the close relation – partner or companion; more rarely, brother or sister – is informed by telephone, very quickly, in general in less than three hours following the request. Nevertheless, it emerges from the reports made by the inspectors that in most cases, the designated person is informed by means of a message left on their answerphone, which does not guarantee that the information will reach them. In a police station in the Paris region, it was specified that: “We have a best-efforts obligation, not an obligation to achieve results; this practice has never been called into question by judges”. Moreover, this formality, which was sometimes subject to a separate official record appended to the police report, is henceforth recorded by a line or two added to the body of the official record of notification of rights, generally without any details making it possible to verify the terms thereof. Finally, although the law provides that medical examination of persons in police custody is de jure if a member of the family so requests, it does not provide for systematic notification of the family of this possibility at the time of notification of police custody measures. Thus, in practice, it is exceptional for close relations to be informed of this right. With regard to minors The inspectors have ascertained that special attention is given to the situation of minors. In most cases the State Prosecutor’s Office is notified by telephone, including at night, in addition to being sent the police custody slip by fax or e-mail. The parent with whom the child resides231, the person or service constituting the child’s “guardian�� are systematically and quickly 229 Cf. article L.3211-3 of the Public Health Code. 230 Cf. article 63-2 of the Code of criminal procedure. 231 The law provides for the notification of “the parents”. 149