Olympics
Ahead of Olympics, more prison spaces being prepared for violators
A police crackdown that aims to clear a poor suburb of petty crime and street vendors before the Paris 2024 Olympics is putting pressure on an overcrowded prison operating at almost double its capacity.
Villepinte is a grey, concrete detention centre in the suburb of Seine-Saint Denis. It lies 2.5 km from the Paris Arena Nord, set to host boxing and fencing competitions during the Games beginning on July 26.
It is among the most crowded prisons in France. Opened in 1991, Villepinte takes prisoners from the busy Bobigny courthouse nearby for pre-trial detention and short sentences.
“The penitentiary authority needs to prepare for the worst,” Eric Mathais, chief prosecutor at Bobigny, said in an interview.
Reducing inmate numbers ahead of the Olympics is unrealistic, Mathais said.
“We need to limit the number of people being imprisoned, but this is easier said than done as I am under extreme pressure from everyone to be clearly more repressive.”
Reuters interviewed thirteen prosecutors, judges, lawyers and clerks working in Bobigny court, who said that the Seine-Saint-Denis justice system was operating at the limits of its capacity and prosecuting increasingly minor infractions in preparation for the Games.
As of April 8, when Reuters visited Villepinte with local senator Corinne Narassiguin, there were 1,048 inmates for 582 places at the prison, according to director Pascal Spenle. The penitentiary cannot technically handle many more, Spenle said.
Reuters spoke to four inmates who described spending most of their days inside their cells, with up to three prisoners in cells designed for one, sharing a toilet and showering every other day. At least 17 prisoners were sleeping on mattresses on the floor, prison authorities said.
Yanis, a 20-year-old inmate, said he’d been on a waiting list for months for a prison work programme. One of his two cellmates, Adil, 25, said he had not met a reintegration councillor during seven months inside.
Prison doctor Ludovic Levasseur said he’d seen demand for mental health care rise in recent years while overcrowding meant long waiting lists for psychologists handling up to 60 patients each.
To avoid reaching breaking point, judges at Bobigny courthouse almost doubled the number of early releases from Villepinte and another prison last year, to nearly 500.
Still, Villepinte was operating at 180% of capacity in early April, from 177% in April last year and 168% the year before, data from the prison and Ministry of Justice shows.
Ahead of an expected surge in the Olympics build up, Spenle said, Villepinte plans to transfer inmates to other prisons, freeing up 220 places. In the longer term the prison will get a new wing, he said.
In a letter to French prosecutors dated 15 January, Justice Minister Eric Dupond-Moretti called for “fast, strong and systematic responses” to infractions that may disrupt the Games.
Spokesperson Cedric Logelin said the ministry was taking measures to reduce overcrowding and prevent crime during the Games. He said court decisions were independent.
“SHORT-TERM SOLUTIONS”
Many of the Olympic events are being held in Seine-Saint-Denis. The region has the highest ratio of immigrants among France’s departments and is also the poorest.
Teachers have been on strike since February, saying schools in the area are under-resourced. Homeless and traveller populations have set up camps and squats in the department.
In some neighbourhoods, informal sellers line the streets.
Mohamed Gnabaly, mayor of Ile Saint Denis, a town in the area, said the Olympics had helped infrastructure and housing development delayed for years due to lack of investment.
However, Olivier Cahn, a sociologist at CESDIP, a French centre for research on law and prisons, said a reliance on policing and tough sentencing was disproportionately affecting the poor, migrant and homeless populations.
“All we have are short-term solutions,” said Cahn.
A zero-tolerance policing initiative launched last year that targets street crimes such as drug dealing and unlicensed selling in the area was adding to the prison population, prosecutor Mathais said.
Police deployed 4,000 extra officers in March and April, Seine-Saint-Denis police director of local security Michel Lavaud told reporters last week, calling it a clean up and saying the operation provided safety for locals and “tourists, audiences, the families of the athletes.”
“It is just the beginning, we are going to increase the intensity” ahead of the Games, Lavaud said.
The crackdown drew criticism from seven legal professionals Reuters spoke to.
Fouad Qnia, a defence lawyer at Bobigny, said heavy penalties for infractions such as unlicensed street selling were disproportionate and could further marginalise people in already vulnerable situations.
CIGARETTE SELLERS
The recent policing operation targeted street vendors, police chief Lavaud said, including nearly 200 illegal cigarette sellers, some of whom were imprisoned and more than half of whom were handed deportation orders.
In one case, on April 3, a Bobigny judge ordered an Algerian man who moved to France two years ago to refrain from entering Seine-Saint-Denis for six months, including for the duration of the Games, after he was convicted of selling eight packets of cigarettes on the street.
He had previously been handed a suspended prison sentence and will face two months in jail, likely in Villepinte, if he is caught again in Seine-Saint-Denis or selling tobacco, assigned defence lawyer Jade Paya said, declining to name the man.
“They are in need. They don’t sell cigarettes because they like doing it,” she said.
Villepinte houses more than thirty nationalities, deputy director David Langelois said. He said the number of foreign inmates was high due to detentions at the nearby Charles de Gaulle airport and the demographic makeup of Seine-Saint-Denis.
Foreigners were 21% of France’s prison population in 2020, whereas they were just 10% of the general population, according to national statistics. France does not keep ethnic statistics, but some sociological studies attest to an over-representation of Black and Arab men in prisons.
Senator Narassiguin said people of colour faced heavier policing and harsh penalties for petty street crime. Ministry of Justice spokesperson Logelin said court sentences were based on individual cases. He declined to comment on the ratio of foreign prisoners.
BRIMMING PRISONS
France has the most overcrowded prisons in Europe after Romania and Cyprus, with its prison population growing faster in 2022 than anywhere in the bloc other than Slovenia, data from the Council of Europe shows.
Nationally, French prisons have never been fuller, Ministry of Justice data shows.
The Council of Europe expressed “deep concern” last month at the worsening overcrowding.
To deal with the caseload it expects during the games, the Bobigny court is preparing to pile on fast-track trials, which the International Prison Observatory (OIP) says are eight times more likely to end in a prison sentence than standard trials.
The use of fast-track procedures has gradually risen in recent years, justice ministry data shows, and has helped drive France’s prison overcrowding, said OIP researcher Johann Bihr.
The limited access to activities and support inside prisons because of overcrowding complicates reintegration into society, said charity Emergence 93, which works with former detainees.
Adding to the strain, during the Olympics, two car washes run by Emergence 93 that employ former prisoners in Seine-Saint-Denis will be forced to close. One car wash is in a shopping mall car park closed during the Games, the other on a site rented to the Japanese delegation.
Emergence 93 social worker Manuel Chajmowiez said the charity had asked Games organizers to allow ex-prisoners to clean some of a fleet of 500 cars provided for athletes and officials, but had not heard back.
“For now we have no work to offer,” Chajmowiez said.
-Reuters
Tickets for the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games will go on sale to the general public on April 9, organisers said on Monday, as LA28 also moved to reassure fans over ticket security by naming a group of verified resale platforms that will begin operating in 2027.
A presale for residents in qualifying areas of Los Angeles and Oklahoma City will begin on April 2, with notification emails for selected buyers set to roll out from March 31 through April 4, LA28 said.
On April 7, the organising committee will notify remaining registrants whether they were selected for a purchase window in the first general sales round, known as Drop 1.
“This week marks the first opportunity for fans to claim a seat at the LA28 Olympic Games,” LA28 Chief Executive Officer Reynold Hoover said in a statement.
LA28’s ticketing programme will include 1 million tickets priced at $28, the lowest price point. Roughly 5% of the Olympic tickets will cost over $1,000, while more than 75% of all tickets, including finals, will be under $400 and nearly 50% of all tickets will be under $200.
“Tickets are comparable to and in many cases well under what we see for other professional sporting and major entertainment events in the U.S.,” Allison Katz-Mayfield, LA28 Senior Vice President, Games Delivery Revenue, told reporters on a call.
RESALE PROGRAMME
Separately, LA28 said its verified multi-platform resale programme would open in 2027, with AXS and Eventim serving as the official secondary ticket marketplace and Ticketmaster and Sports Illustrated Tickets also designated as verified resale platforms.
The announcement comes as organisers prepare for the first ticket drop and seek to warn fans against buying from unauthorised sellers before the resale programme launches.
LA28 said primary tickets would only be sold through its official ticket service providers, AXS and Eventim. It added that any LA28 tickets offered for resale before 2027 should not be considered verified.
“While LA28’s resale platforms will not be launched until 2027, having a variety of platforms was critical to providing fans multiple points of access to verified tickets,” Hoover said.
LOCAL PRESALE
Fans who registered for the LA28 ticket draw and whose billing postal codes fall within qualifying counties were automatically entered into the local presale draw. Those selected will receive 48-hour purchase windows running from April 2 through April 6 and must use a payment method tied to a billing postal code in an eligible county to complete their purchase.
For both the local presale and Drop 1, selected buyers will have 48 hours to purchase tickets, while any tickets placed in a cart must be checked out within 30 minutes. Buyers may complete multiple transactions during their allotted window until they reach the ticket limit.
LA28 said tickets would be available across all Olympic sports, as well as for the opening ceremony at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood and the closing ceremony at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum.
Fans selected for time slots may buy up to 12 tickets for Olympic events, plus up to 12 tickets for the soccer tournament that will not count toward the general Olympic-event limit. Ceremony tickets will be capped at four per buyer and will count towards the 12-ticket maximum.
Registrants who are not assigned a time slot in either the local presale or Drop 1 will be automatically entered into future draws, LA28 said. Paralympic tickets are due to go on sale in 2027.
Ticket-inclusive hospitality packages from official provider On Location are also expected to go on sale in April. Visa will be the official payment method for purchases.
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Organizers of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic and Paralympic Games unveiled the event’s official visual identity on Monday, a floral-themed design system meant to reflect the city’s landscape, neighbourhoods and cultural character.
The branding will appear across competition venues, fan areas, citywide installations, signage, digital platforms and broadcast presentations during the Games, LA28 said.
At the centre of the design is the “Superbloom,” a reference to the bursts of wildflowers that can blanket parts of Southern California after periods of rain.
LA28 said the concept was intended as a metaphor for the Games, with years of preparation culminating in a short, high-profile global event.
The core graphic is built around 13 individual blooms, which organizers said represent different elements of Los Angeles, from its entertainment culture to its neighbourhoods, people and native landscape.
The colour palette draws on the Bird of Paradise, the official flower of Los Angeles, and is grouped into four families – Poppy, Scarlet Flax, Bluebell and Sagebrush – to evoke the region’s terrain and vegetation.
Organizers said the typographic style was inspired by Los Angeles street signage, including strip mall and hand-painted storefront lettering, in an effort to give the identity a distinctly local feel.
LA28 said the design was developed to work across a wide range of settings, from nearly century-old venues to new facilities, while also accounting for broadcast requirements, digital formats and lighting conditions. The organising committee partnered with design studio Koto on the project.
The identity was unveiled more than two years before the Olympic opening ceremony in what organizers described as an unusually early rollout, allowing partners and stakeholders more time to incorporate the branding into their materials.
Los Angeles will host the Olympics for a third time in 2028, after staging the Games in 1932 and 1984. It will also host the Paralympics for the first time.
-Reuters
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Organisers of the 2028 Los Angeles Olympics said on Monday that registration for the first ticket draw will close on March 18, as the Games begin to take shape with the first baseball qualifiers confirmed and the soccer tournament schedule expanded.
More than five million fans from 197 countries and territories have registered at tickets.la28.org since January for a chance to buy tickets, LA28 said, underscoring strong early demand for the Summer Games, which are due to open on July 14, 2028.
Fans who register by the March 18 deadline will be eligible for a lottery to receive a purchase window for the first ticket release, scheduled for April 9-19.
There will also be a local presale running from April 2-6 for eligible residents in parts of Southern California and Oklahoma. Oklahoma City will host softball and canoe slalom.
LA28 said selected applicants would be notified by email between March 31 and April 7. Fans picked for the first sale window will be able to buy up to 12 tickets for Olympic events, subject to availability, with a four-ticket cap for each of the opening and closing ceremonies.
BASEBALL RETURNS
The ticketing update comes as the first teams booked places in the Olympic baseball tournament through the 2026 World Baseball Classic. The Dominican Republic and Venezuela secured qualification spots from the Americas, joining host United States in the six-team field.
Baseball, one of the sports added to the LA28 programme, will return to the Olympics for the first time since the Tokyo Games and will be played at Dodger Stadium from July 13-19. The remaining three places will be decided through international qualifying tournaments in 2027 and 2028.
LA28 also confirmed that the Olympic soccer tournament will begin on July 10, four days before the opening ceremony, following a decision by the International Olympic Committee Executive Board to extend the competition window.
Organisers said the longer schedule would give teams two additional rest days compared with previous Games.
Group-stage and quarter-final matches will be staged in seven U.S. cities – New York, Columbus, Nashville, St. Louis, San Jose, San Diego and Pasadena – with the men’s and women’s gold medal matches to be played at the Rose Bowl.
LA28 said kickoff times and the full schedule would be released later this year.
-Reuters
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