Article 746 Spanish Criminal Procedure Act: Grounds for suspending the trial hearing

The suspension of the trial hearing shall in addition be appropriate in the following cases:

1. Where the court has to determine during the argument an incidental question which for any well founded reason cannot be decided at once.

2. Where, in accordance with this Code, the court or one of its members has to carry out some step outside the place of the sessions and it cannot be effected in the interval between one session and another.

3. Where the witnesses for the prosecution and for the defence offered by the parties do not appear and the court considers their statements necessary.

The court may, however, in that case order the continuation of the trial and the taking of the remaining evidence; and after that has been done, suspend it until the absent witnesses appear.

If the non appearance of the witness is for the reason set out in Article 718, the course determined in that article and in the two following articles shall be followed.

4. Where a member of the court, the prosecutor or the defence counsel of any of the parties falls suddenly ill to the point of being unable to continue taking part in the trial, and in the case of counsel where that person cannot be replaced without serious inconvenience to the defence of the party concerned.

The same shall apply, in the case of the counsel of any of the parties, in cases of the death, hospitalisation or surgical intervention for a serious cause of a relative up to the second degree by consanguinity or affinity.

5. Where one of the accused persons is in the case of the preceding number, in such terms that the person cannot be present at the trial.

The suspension shall not be ordered on this ground except after hearing the medical practitioners appointed by the court for the examination of the sick person.

6. Where unexpected disclosures or retractions produce substantial alterations in the trial, making new items of evidence or some supplementary summary investigation necessary.

The trial shall not be suspended by reason of the illness or non appearance of one of the accused persons who have been personally summoned, provided that the court considers, after hearing the parties and recording in the minutes of the trial the reasons for the decision, that there are sufficient elements to try them independently.

Where the accused is a legal person, the provisions of Article 786 bis of this Act shall apply.

7. Where the proceedings are ones in which the professional of the legal profession has been designated through the duty roster, the proceedings shall be suspended only for the time which the corresponding professional association takes to provide the designation of a new professional, in order to avoid causing a denial of defence to the party. If the suspension is sought because childbirth has occurred or begun suddenly, or without sufficient time for another lawyer to take charge of the matter and to prepare it, the listing shall be suspended for the minimum indispensable time having regard to its complexity.

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: Royal Decree of 14 September 1882 approving the Spanish Criminal Procedure Act.