Bringing justice into prison : for a common European approach : white paper on access to justice for pre-trial detainees

A report based on comparative analysis and empirical studies in nine EU countries by the research project EUPRETRIALRIGHTS. This document is the main result of a wide-scale enquiry conducted within the programme “Improving protection of fundamental rights and access to legal aid for remand prisoners in the European Union” (EURPRETRIALRIGHTS) 1. This programme drew a picture of both legal provisions regarding access of remand prisoners to justice and legal aid, and of the actual enforcement of those provisions on the ground, in the nine EU members states being part of the study — namely France, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Italy, Spain, Poland, Czech Republic and Bulgaria 2. The purpose of this White Paper is (1) to provide its readers with a comprehensive vision of the mechanisms, proceedings and strategies that may facilitate or hinder effective access to justice for remand prisoners (2) to propose their critical analysis, and (3) to come up with relevant, evidence‑based proposals for legal improvement of effective access of remand prisoners to legal aid at the European level. In this perspective, it has been conceived as a usable tool bringing the results of our research to national and European institutional stakeholders, and promoting legal harmonization as well as an adaptation of practical logics of access to legal aid within the EU