Different types of penal institutions hold women :

• penal institutions exclusively for women
• units exclusively for women They are dispersed throughout 58 facilities. 2,458 places are reserved for them throughout the system. The female prisoner population density varies from one facility to another.
  Most of the women are incarcerated inspecific sections of prisons that are mainly for men.

There are three exclusively dedicated facilities:

• Rennes Penitentiary Centre
• Fresnes detention centre
• Fleury-Mérogis detention centre

The guards are female, but management personnel may be male.

Overpopulation affects female units in some of the detention centres. At sud-francilien de Réau prison, there are 67 women for 89 places, while at Nîmes detention centre there are 51 women for 24 places, that is an occupation rate of 213%.

Searches are conducted by a female staff member.

Under the Act of 2 February 1945, children and young people under 18 are subject to a special justice system. The Juvenile Judge, Juvenile Court, and the Assize Court for minors follow a different process than those for adults (taking into account the mitigation of responsibility, closed door hearings, etc.).

On 1 January 2018, 352 minors were housed in six detention facilities for minors (établissements pénitentiaires pour mineurs (EPM)); the others are dispersed among the 47 juvenile units (quartiers pour mineurs (QM)).
The assignation of the juveniles to the different centres must take into account their interests, such as the place of residence, their education needs, and the proximity to the court in charge of the dossier.

The detention system in the EPMs is a mixture of repression and education. Group events (cultural and sport activities) are held, and sometimes are deemed to be excessive. Minors are usually housed in single cells.

The Judicial Youth Protection (Protection judiciaire de la jeunesse) provides teaching staff to the EPMs and QMs. The other staff members (guards, health) are, in principle, specially trained. Guards assigned to QMs do not always receive specialized training to deal with minors. Prison and teaching staff have reported problems they encounter when there is overcrowding. Schooling is mandatory until age 16, as on the outside.

As of 1 January 2018, the number of minors detained was as follows:

• 89 minors under 16 years of age
• 683 minors between 16 and 18 years of age.
• 63.8% of incarcerated minors are untried.

The EPMs are facilities for minors under the age of 18 and have an average capacity for 60 persons, while the QMs are juvenile units into adult facilities. The penitentiary system counts 1,151 places reserved for minors; the average occupancy rate is 66%.
The experience shows that these facilities are difficult to administer once the occupancy rate surpasses 50%.

Young girls can only be admitted in three EPMs. In 2017, the Judicial Youth Protection Directorate (Direction de la protection judiciaire de la jeunesse (PJJ) envisaged reducing territorial disparities of the detention centres for young girls.
Minors cannot be sentenced for life, except under extraordinary circumstances.

Illegal residency is no longer considered an indictable offence per se, but its consequences may be.

Even though there is no obligation to group foreigners in specific units, the practice of non-institutional and non-generalized “ethnic sorting” persists. It leads to a division within quarters based on nationality or origin, real or supposed, on the sole criteria of a person skin colour. Some prisoners request to be with a cellmate with whom they can communicate.
Foreigners are often victims of discrimination when it comes to obtaining work, sentence adjustments and in maintaining family ties, and they are even more vulnerable when they cannot speak French. All requests must be made in writing, which is not always possible for foreign prisoners. In theory, an interpreter must assist them during the entire procedure, including the disciplinary one, but there are not enough interpreters, or they may even be unavailable.

The issues associated with the right of residence also contribute to daily stresses of prison life. Incarceration is an obstacle in terms of undertaking the necessary steps, which have become very complicated.
The process of obtaining a residency permit requires obligatory meetings in the prefecture. Prisoners are required to apply for temporary absences, which are often not granted. Interviews for asylum seekers may now be carried out inside the prisons with audio-visual methods of communication - complete with all the difficulty that these methods entail, including: lack of confidentiality, mistrust, interpretation, etc. Persons ordered to leave French soil usually benefit from a 48-hour appeal period, but the process for people in detention is complex.

Life sentences are for the most serious crimes (certain kinds of murders and terrorism).

“Unconditional imprisonment” excludes the possibility of adjusting a sentence for a period of 18 years. This detention can be shortened or extended, under certain conditions, for a maximum of 22 years.
Life imprisonment without possibility of release is the most severe sentence under French law and is subject to an unlimited, unconditional period of detention. Three particularly serious crimes (certain kinds of murders and terrorism) lead to a “real” life sentence.
A possibility of release exists, in practice, for people condemned to life imprisonment without possibility of release. The article 720-4 provides for the possibility of re-examining the case after thirty years of incarceration. The judge’s decision may only be taken after a panel of three experts chosen from the list of experts accredited to the Court of Cassation has stated its opinion as to the danger of the convicted person.

People of certain religious or ethnic groups are not subject to any particular detention regime.

The adjustment of their daily life is determined, on a case by case basis, by prison staff.

Older prisoners are not divided off into groups in the facilities or into specific units. The facilities are not designed to accommodate them: the pace of daily prison routine and its organisation are sources of anxiety.

Prisoners at end-of-life can benefit from conditional release. Another sentence adjustment available for medical reasons allows prisoners with a life-threatening prognosis to spend their final days with loved ones. These procedures are not always adopted, mostly, because of the lack of housing upon release. Some seniors have to spend the rest of their days in prison, with personnel who are neither trained nor have the resources to assist them.

The number of older prisoners increased by six times over the last 25 years.
There appears to be a lack of appropriate activities, limited access to work and little medical care. Doctors have also reported problems with procuring medical equipment. Older prisoners find it difficult to receive human assistance and are often forced to get help from other inmates.