Domestic and Gender Violence Defence Lawyer in Spain

Under article 544 ter of the Criminal Procedure Act the court can impose a protection order where there are indications of an offence and an objective situation of risk. It typically prohibits approaching the complainant within a set distance and any form of communication, and it may suspend contact with children and remove the defendant from the family home.

It is a precautionary measure, not a conviction, and it can be argued against with evidence about the real level of risk. What cannot be done is to ignore it. Any contact, including a message sent by a third party or a reply to a message the complainant sent first, is a fresh criminal offence under article 468.2, and Spanish courts have consistently held that the consent of the protected person does not remove liability.

Complaints motivated by a custody dispute or a property conflict exist, and where the evidence supports it the point has to be made squarely. It also has to be made carefully. Presenting a case as a fabrication without evidence damages credibility and hardens the position of both the prosecutor and the court.

The disciplined approach is to argue what can be proved: inconsistencies between the successive accounts, the absence of corroboration for specific episodes, the chronology of the complaint against the civil proceedings, and any documented motive. Where a complaint is shown to have been knowingly false, articles 456 and 457 provide for false accusation and simulation of an offence.

The Criminal Code gives special protection to violence within the family and the couple. Article 153 punishes physical or psychological violence of lesser gravity against a spouse, a former spouse or a particularly vulnerable person living in the household, while article 173, paragraph two, punishes habitual violence. The area is further shaped by Organic Law 1/2004 on protection against gender violence.

These cases are heard by specialised courts and follow their own dynamics, in which the early stages, and the measures taken within hours of a complaint, often set the course of the whole proceedings.

Proof in this area is often complex, resting on the accounts of the people involved, medical and psychological reports and, at times, messages or recordings. The assessment of credibility and the search for objective corroboration are central.

A careful defence engages with that evidence directly while insisting on the presumption of innocence, which applies here with the same force as in any other proceedings.

These proceedings often move very quickly, with an arrest followed within hours by a hearing at which protection measures and the question of liberty are decided. What is said and done in that short window frequently shapes the entire case.

We intervene immediately, so that neither an accused person nor a complainant faces those first decisive hours, including any statement, without proper advice.

The consequences of these proceedings can reach into family life, affecting contact with children, the use of the family home and, in some cases, the possession of firearms or professional licences. Protective measures can have immediate practical effects long before any trial.

We address these wider consequences from the start, since for most clients they are as pressing as the criminal charge itself.