The prefecture dredged up convictions from 20 years ago to deny him his papers: Moroccan man wins appeal

Born in 1973 in Mont-de-Marsan and a Moroccan national, the man had obtained a residence card valid for ten years on May 17, 2012. On March 10, 2023, he applied to the Landes prefecture to renew it. After an initial tacit rejection, the prefect officially refused his application on December 20 of that year, according to the ruling handed down on September 17, 2026, by the Bordeaux Administrative Court of Appeal.

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The administration considered that the Moroccan man no longer met the “republican integration” requirement for obtaining his card. It then dredged up several convictions handed down by the Mont-de-Marsan Criminal Court between July 1992 and July 2004.

The offenses included insulting a public official, property damage, violence with a weapon, aggravated theft, attempted escape, armed robbery, receiving stolen goods, and the unlawful possession of a weapon. The man had received prison sentences, but the prefecture did not specify their exact nature or length.

However, these convictions had a major weakness: they all predated the residence card granted in 2012. When it was issued, the most recent offenses had already taken place eight years earlier and had not prevented the administration from granting him a card valid for ten years.

Three reports, but no established prosecutions

The prefecture also cited three reports from the police services. The Moroccan man had allegedly been known unfavorably for drug-related offenses in 2016, complicity in a group theft in 2019, and acts of violence in 2020.

But the administration did not show that these cases had resulted in a conviction. It did not even claim that the man had been prosecuted for these acts. In the court’s view, these reports alone did not establish that he was no longer integrated into French society.

The judges therefore considered two points: the criminal convictions were old and already known when the card was issued in 2012, while the more recent acts had not resulted in any established prosecution or conviction.

The case is similar to that of another Moroccan man who had lived in France for 56 years, whose renewal refusal was also overturned. In both cases, the administration had cited the applicant’s criminal record without sufficiently establishing his circumstances at the time of the decision.

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The court ruled that the Landes prefect had made an error of assessment. It overturned the refusal of December 20, 2023, as well as the part of the judgment in which the Pau Administrative Court had dismissed the Moroccan man’s appeal. He therefore won his appeal, but not the 2,000 euros he had claimed from the state: as a recipient of full legal aid, he had not shown that he had personally incurred any other costs.