In January 2009, the French president addressed his New Year wishes to the country’s magistrates. A few seconds into his speech, the bomb was dropped.

“The overlapping of investigative power and jurisdictional power is no longer acceptable. The time has come for the investigating magistrate to make way for a magistrate who will supervise investigations but will no longer direct them,” said President Sarkozy.

On Tuesday, the Leger Commission in charge of suggesting ways to reform the French judiciary will hand out its report to President Sarkozy.

It doesn’t come as a surprise that one of the main recommendations is abolishing investigating magistrates – independent judges that are unique to France’s justice system.

Brought in during the reign of Napoleon, these judges conduct investigations in the case of sensitive and complex enquiries. There are 600 investigating judges in France who oversee 37,000 cases every year – that’s only 9 percent of the total number of criminal court cases.

Up until now in France, when there’s a crime, it has been the prosecutor who decides to launch an inquiry.

On a practical level it’s the police that are in charge of the inquiry, under the authority of the investigating magistrate. He hears witnesses and suspects, can order searches, indict or put people in custody.

However, since 2000, he can no longer order remand (imprisonment pending trial).

The Leger Commission’s conclusion is that the investigating magistrate has too many powers and this must be changed. The report states: "The examining magistrate is both a judge and investigator. In other words he’s not completely a judge and not completely an investigator.”

To replace the examining magistrate, the commission suggests handing out the investigation powers to state prosecutors who are supervised by the minister of justice. To counter-balance this dependency on the executive branch, the commission suggests appointing an independent judge who would act as a referee.

Some say this will compromise the independence of the French justice system and could mean that some cases – especially bribery affairs involving politicians and businessmen - remain in the dark.

“This will mark the end of inquiries which could potentially harass the ruling government. This is the ultimate goal of this reform”, says Thomas Clay, dean of the Versailles Faculty of Law.

The Leger Commission report also suggests lowering the legal custody period pending trial. For those who support this reform, this evolution will put more emphasis on the presumption of innocence; for its detractors this could be the death of an independent judicial system.