To escape article 521-1 of the Penal Code, which punishes “serious abuse” or “acts of cruelty” inflicted on animals here in captivity with three years in prison and a fine of 45,000 euros, bullfighting shows must to assert “an uninterrupted local tradition”.
Three years without bullfighting: a suspension that changes everything
However, the bullfight of La Brà ̈de, organized for 25 years but suspended in 2020 and 2021 because of Covid according to the town hall, did not take place in 2025 either, this time due to « budget constraints and demand ».
For the town, it was a question of changing its economic model, by relying more on patrons, to organize a new one in 2026: “I never said that La Brède was renouncing its bullfighting culture”, argued its mayor, Michel Dufranc, lawyer for profession and aficionado, on May 12 at the hearing.
Jallikattu, this bullfighting that challenges without killing
Every year at the start of the year, jallikattu sets Tamil Nadu ablaze: a no-kill bullfight where men challenge bulls at full speed with their bare hands. Between tradition, pride and controversies.
According to him, the local tradition in which the show is part has in no way fallen “into obsolescence” but the judge of the administrative court ruled out the very presence of such a culture in the surroundings of Bordeaux, pointing out “the low attendance of the public.”
“We are in an isolated place […] where the bullfighting culture is moribund,” argued, along the same lines, the lawyer for the Anti-Corrida Alliance, applicant with the animal defense association One Voice.
The anti-bullfights win a new victory
As the event scheduled for June 20 approached, the magistrate considered that there was serious doubt about the legality of the organization of a new bullfight, and suspended the municipal decision pending a judgment on the merits of the case.
In October, the Toulouse administrative court of appeal confirmed the ban on the municipality of Pérols (Hérault) from resuming the organization of a bullfight, which it had attempted to do in 2023 after an interruption of around twenty years.
“The Anti-Corrida Alliance will scrupulously ensure compliance with the court’s ruling […] which will set a precedent,” warned the president of the association, Claire Starozinski, at the end of this first case in which the commune of Pérols was represented by a law firm… founded by Michel Dufranc, mayor of La Brède.
