# Abagnale's CATCH ME IF YOU CAN: Are French prisons really this awful?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abagnales-catch-me-if-you-can-are-french-prisons-really-this-awful/222441
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [January 3, 2004, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abagnales-catch-me-if-you-can-are-french-prisons-really-this-awful/222441 "2004-01-03T06:11:30Z")
**Posts on this page:** 8
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)
#### Post date: [January 3, 2004, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abagnales-catch-me-if-you-can-are-french-prisons-really-this-awful/222441/1 "2004-01-03T06:11:30Z")
I just finished reading Frank Abagnale’s CATCH ME IF YOU CAN (on which the movie is loosely based) and he describes his ordeal in French prison at Perpignan. Prisoners, even those there for non-violent offenses, were stripped naked and thrown into 5x5x5 cubes where they were kept in complete darkness, fed subsistence diets, not allowed to bathe or brush their teeth, had no human contact, and had only a bucket for sewage (which was rarely emptied, causing them to lie in their own waste when it overflowed). He remained there 6 months before being released, by which time he had double pneumonia, severe skin rashes and rotted teeth. He said that Italian prisons were rumored to be just as bad.
Is this true or totally exaggerated? Were French prisons really that bad in the 1970s? Do they still practice this? It seems as inhumane as anything the Nazis would have employed. (I have no sympathy for Abagnale being confined- I think he should have receive far more prison time than he got as he was guilty as sin and I didn’t find him the least bit charming- but the punishment seems to far exceed the crime.)
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### Author:  [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)
#### Post date: [January 3, 2004, 6:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abagnales-catch-me-if-you-can-are-french-prisons-really-this-awful/222441/2 "2004-01-03T06:31:06Z")
[http://www.studentbmj.com/back\_issues/0300/news/55b.html](http://www.studentbmj.com/back_issues/0300/news/55b.html)
This seems to say the same thing, from what i can gather. Vasseur apparently was a doctor in the 90s.
[http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=fr&u=http://www.denistouret.net/textes/Vasseur.html&prev=/search%3Fq%3DV%C3%A9ronique%2BVasseur%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26oe%3DUTF-8%26sa%3DG](http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=fr&u=http://www.denistouret.net/textes/Vasseur.html&prev=/search%3Fq%3DV%25C3%25A9ronique%2BVasseur%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26oe%3DUTF-8%26sa%3DG)
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### Author:  [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)
#### Post date: [January 3, 2004, 6:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abagnales-catch-me-if-you-can-are-french-prisons-really-this-awful/222441/3 "2004-01-03T06:32:15Z")
[Abagnale](http://www.toacorn.com/news/2003/1120/Community/031.html) talks about prison.
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### Author:  [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)
#### Post date: [January 3, 2004, 6:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abagnales-catch-me-if-you-can-are-french-prisons-really-this-awful/222441/4 "2004-01-03T06:37:06Z")
[This group](http://quickstart.clari.net/qs_se/webnews/wed/bs/Ufrance-prisons.RMYQ_DOS.html) doesn’t speak highly of **current** conditions.
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### Author:  [@galen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/galen)
#### Post date: [January 3, 2004, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abagnales-catch-me-if-you-can-are-french-prisons-really-this-awful/222441/5 "2004-01-03T14:27:00Z")
Hmmm.
61,000 inmates for a population of 55 million equals one inmate per 900 Frenchmen.
Two million inmates in a population of 280 million equals one inmate for each 140 US citizens.
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### Author:  [@netscape\_6](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/netscape_6)
#### Post date: [January 3, 2004, 2:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abagnales-catch-me-if-you-can-are-french-prisons-really-this-awful/222441/6 "2004-01-03T14:42:50Z")
hmm.
human rights violations
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### Author:  [@Osip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Osip)
#### Post date: [January 3, 2004, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abagnales-catch-me-if-you-can-are-french-prisons-really-this-awful/222441/7 "2004-01-03T21:21:45Z")
Hope you read the original version of “Catch me if you Can”
The newer versions left out a few chapters.
I hear they are a bit better, but still very much geared toward punishment than rehabilitation.
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### Author:  [@DBNY](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DBNY)
#### Post date: [January 3, 2004, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/abagnales-catch-me-if-you-can-are-french-prisons-really-this-awful/222441/8 "2004-01-03T23:29:22Z")
> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by galen \*
> \*\*Hmmm.
>
> 61,000 inmates for a population of 55 million equals one inmate per 900 Frenchmen.
>
> Two million inmates in a population of 280 mpillion equals one inmate for each 140 US citizens. \*\*
I did a search on US prison population and found this site:
[US Prison Pop](http://en2.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_prison_population)
According to this site, the US prison population increased from 1.38 million in 2000 to 2.1 million by 2002. That’s about a 50% increase, a significant jump.