The money laundering offence, set out in Articles 301 to 304 of the Criminal Code, targets conduct designed to channel criminally derived assets into the lawful economy by concealing or disguising their illicit origin. The basic penalty ranges from six months’ to six years’ imprisonment, together with a fine of up to three times the […]

In our recent article, at Ayuela Jiménez we analysed Constitutional Court Judgment (STC) 15/2026, of 23 February, and noted that it could mark a turning point in pre-trial detention practice. The legality of what had hitherto been tolerated —that a generic “summary” or purely formal access to the incriminating evidence sufficed to order pre-trial detention— […]

For over a decade, Spanish criminal procedural law has included a key safeguard to ensure that a suspect in proceedings subject to secrecy (secreto de sumario) can effectively exercise their right of defence: their lawyer may (or, as will be seen, may only theoretically) have access to the essential elements of the proceedings underlying the […]