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Even though the legislation on the rights of patients seems to imply that professional interpreters should be employed when allophone patients are being taken care of in the medical system, this is all but systematically the case. The situation is quite different in the judiciary system, where binding laws impose the systematic use of professional interpreters for allophone litigants. This study intends to articulate and discuss what underlies this difference. On the basis of field work among health professionals, it shows the medical and legal consequences of the lack of interpreters and underlines the hurdles and the justifications invoked to explain it. This data is put into perspective with the ethical, historical and legal evolutions that have taken place in the fields both of medicine and justice. If it seems crucial to build a binding legislation on the question, this can only be achieved through a global analysis of the health system and the formation of interpreters.