French Consumer Law is a comprehensive and comparative overview of French and EU law in this field, covering: advertising, unfair commercial practices, conditions for the validity of contracts, unfair terms, product conformity, latent defects, product safety.

French Consumer Law

Article 8, as amended , of the Code of Criminal Procedure provides that, in tort, the limitation period for prosecution is six years, provided that no investigation or prosecution has been initiated in the meantime. The limitation period may thus be interrupted by reports made by investigators, as they constitute police action .
Although the offense of fraud is, in principle, an “instantaneous” of …

Limitation period

Under Article R. 512-9 (former Article R. 215-1) of the Consumer Code, proof of offenses may be established by any legal means. The existence of offenses of fraud and falsification can thus be demonstrated by a simple observation of the presence of seals on samples of chaptalized wine  or by the scriptural analysis of the registry of chaptalization concerning wines of the same property which shows that maneuvers intended to distort the recording of their enrichment has enabled to conceal the sugar assigned to the overchaptalization of the beverage in question . Similarly, spontaneous confessions made by the alleged perpetrator of the fraud or falsification during the investigation and reiterated at the hearing are sufficient to establish his guilt . On the other hand, prosecution of the charge of deception cannot be based on reports containing only subjective assessments, without formal and material findings such as to prove that the trader intended to deceive his customer . In addition, according to the Court of Cassation, even if the minutesq and reports established by agents who did not find the offenses themselves are devoid of the special probative force provided for by Articles 429  and 431  of the Code of Criminal Procedure, their statements are taken as simple information and may be sufficient to convince the court on their own .

The public prosecutor assesses the appropriateness of the prosecution and is not bound by the classifications given by the investigators to the facts in their minutes . Pursuant to Article L. 512-42 (formerly Article L. 215-11), the public prosecutor refers the matter to the court or investigating judge if he or she considers, either as a result of the minutes drawn up by the authorized agents, or of the test or analysis report, and, if necessary, after a prior investigation, that a prosecution or inquiry is appropriate.

Before the prosecution, the investigators may resort to the injunction for compliance provided for in Articles L. 521-1 et seq., ordering the person who has committed a breach or offense in relation with their investigative powers (defined in Book VI), within a reasonable period, to comply with his obligations. The Administration can also settle in accordance with the procedure laid down in Articles L. 523-1 to L. 523-4 (former Article L. 141-2) and R. 523-1 to R. 523-4 (former Article R. 141-3) for offenses concerning the safety and compliance of products and services provided for in Book IV. To do so, it must provide the settlement proposal to the public prosecutor within a period of three months from the closure of the report recording the offense. If the public prosecutor gives his/her consent, the administrative authority notifies the settlement proposal in duplicate to the perpetrator. Once the obligations under the settlement are met by the offender, the public action is extinguished.

  Cass. crim., 25 June 2003, LawLex200300003024JBJ.

  Cass. crim., 15 November 2005, LawLex200600001662JBJ.

  Cass. crim., 1 June 1992, LawLex200600001557JBJ.

  CA Aix-en-Provence, 25 November 1997, LawLex200400001218JBJ.

  Code of Criminal Procedure, Article 429: "Any official record or report has probative value only if it is formally regular, and if its drafter acted in the performance of his duties and reported what he personally saw, heard or found on a subject-matter within his jurisdiction. Every official record of an interrogation or a hearing must contain the questions which were answered therein". 

 Code of Criminal Procedure, Article 431: "In the cases where judicial police officers, judicial police agents or the civil servants and agents entrusted with certain judicial police duties have been granted by a special legislative provision the power to establish misdemeanors by official records or reports, proof of the contrary may only be brought in writing or through witnesses". 

 Cass. crim., 15 June 2010, LawLex201400000661JBJ.

 Cass. crim., 23 January 2001, LawLex200300004453JBJ.

Excercise of action

Article 8, as amended , of the Code of Criminal Procedure provides that, in tort, the limitation period for prosecution is six years, provided that no investigation or prosecution has been initiated in the meantime. The limitation period may thus be interrupted by reports made by investigators, as they constitute police action .

Although the offense of fraud is, in principle, an “instantaneous” offense, committed by the delivery of the goods  or by the performance of services, it may, in the case of successively peformed contracts, consist in a set of facts connected by the same criminal intent extending over a fairly long period of time, meaning that the limitation period does not necessarily run from the original agreement . However, as deception is surreptitious by its nature , the Court of Cassation now holds that the starting point of the limitation period is the day on which the offense occurred or could have been established under conditions allowing the prosecution .

 By Law No 2017-242 of 27 February 2017 on reform of the limitation periods in criminal matters, OJ 50 of 28 February 2017.

 Cass. crim., 3 April 1974, LawLex200600001584JBJ; 2 July 1997, LawLex200600000552JBJ.

For an illustration prior to the amendment of Article 8 of the Criminal Code, see Cass. crim., 12 June 2018, LawLex201800000951JBJ, noting that the offense of deception as to the nature, quality, origin or quantity of a good is time-barred when more than three years have elapsed between the first delivery and the notification to proceed from the Public Prosecutor following the complaint, the subsequent deliveries no longer being capable of constituting a deception against the complainant since she was fully informed of the nature and quality of the products and had delivered and marketed them knowingly.

 Cass. crim., 21 November 1983, LawLex201600000508JBJ.

 CA Montpellier, 28 January 2010, LawLex201200001766JBJ.

 Cass. crim., 2 February 2016, LawLex201600000362JBJ: holding, to dismiss the defendant who invoked the limitation period since in May 1995, a pharmacovigilance center had been appointed by the Drug Agency to investigate Mediator due to its structural similarity with the anoretics, that the facts of deception at issue were only brought to the attention of the prosecuting authority during the preliminary investigation revealing that the marketing authorization application for ben?uorex, the active ingredient of Mediator, contained expert reports from which the anoretic indication had been removed, dated back to the introductory submissions.

French Consumer Law

575. Limitation period

Demandez un accès gratuit
au contenu exclusif Livv – juristes d’entreprise

Les décisions de justice citées dans ce paragraphe :

Les notions juridiques connexes

575. Limitation period

Demandez un accès gratuit au contenu exclusif Livv – juristes d’entreprise

Les décisions de justice citées dans ce paragraphe :

Les notions juridiques connexes

Demandez un accès gratuit
au contenu exclusif Livv – juristes d’entreprise