Article 171 Spanish Criminal Code: Conditional threats, blackmail and threats within the family

1. Threats of harm not constituting a criminal offence shall be punished with imprisonment of three months to one year or a fine of six to twenty four months, having regard to the seriousness and circumstances of the act, where the threat is conditional and the condition does not consist of conduct which is owed. Where the offender has achieved the purpose pursued, the penalty shall be imposed in its upper half.

2. Where a person demands from another a sum of money or a reward under the threat of revealing or disseminating facts concerning private life or family relations which are not publicly known and which may affect reputation, credit or interests, that person shall be punished with imprisonment of two to four years if the whole or part of what was demanded was delivered, and of four months to two years if it was not.

3. Where the act described in the preceding paragraph consists in the threat of revealing or reporting the commission of a criminal offence, the public prosecutor may, in order to facilitate the punishment of the threat, refrain from prosecuting the offence whose revelation was threatened, unless that offence is punishable by imprisonment exceeding two years. In the latter case, the judge or court may reduce the penalty by one or two degrees.

4. Whoever slightly threatens a person who is or has been the spouse, or a woman who is or has been bound to the offender by an analogous relationship of affection even without cohabitation, shall be punished with imprisonment of six months to one year or with community service of thirty one to eighty days and, in all cases, deprivation of the right to possess and carry weapons for one year and one day to three years, as well as, where the judge or court considers it appropriate in the interest of the minor or of the person with a disability in need of special protection, special disqualification from the exercise of parental authority, guardianship, curatorship, custody or fostering for up to five years.

The same penalty shall be imposed on whoever slightly threatens a particularly vulnerable person who cohabits with the offender.

5. Whoever slightly threatens with weapons or other dangerous instruments any of the persons referred to in Article 173.2, other than those covered by the preceding paragraph of this article, shall be punished with imprisonment of three months to one year or community service of thirty one to eighty days and, in all cases, deprivation of the right to possess and carry weapons for one to three years, as well as, where the judge or court considers it appropriate in the interest of the minor or of the person with a disability in need of special protection, special disqualification from the exercise of parental authority, guardianship, curatorship, custody or fostering for a term of six months to three years.

The penalties laid down in paragraphs 4 and 5 shall be imposed in their upper half where the offence is committed in the presence of minors, or takes place in the common home or in the home of the victim, or is carried out in breach of a penalty of those contemplated in Article 48 of this Code or of a precautionary or security measure of the same nature.

6. Notwithstanding the provisions of paragraphs 4 and 5, the judge or court may, giving reasons in the judgment and having regard to the personal circumstances of the offender and to those attending the commission of the act, impose the penalty of the next lower degree.

7. Outside the preceding cases, whoever slightly threatens another shall be punished with a fine of one to three months. This act shall be prosecutable only upon complaint by the aggrieved person or by the legal representative of that person.

Where the offended party is one of the persons referred to in paragraph 2 of Article 173, the penalty shall be permanent location of five to thirty days, always in a dwelling different from and distant from that of the victim, or community service of five to thirty days, or a fine of one to four months, the latter only in the cases in which the circumstances set out in paragraph 2 of Article 84 are present. In these cases the complaint referred to in the preceding subparagraph shall not be required.

Working translation prepared by Société Juridique from the consolidated Spanish text published by the Official State Gazette. It has no official status: the only authoritative version is the Spanish original, available at the Official State Gazette and reproduced verbatim in our Spanish-language entry for this provision. Source: Organic Law 10/1995 of 23 November, the Spanish Criminal Code.