The Il·lustre Col·legi de l’Advocacia of Barcelona promotes a legislative proposal to modify the Penal Code to combat multiple recidivism. The initiative proposes, among other things, toughening penalties for those who steal cell phones, the most desired object of thieves. In these cases, since it is a theft - the value of the object does not exceed 400 euros - those responsible for the theft are usually sentenced to a minimum sentence that results in the payment of a fine.
Faced with a situation in which petty crime is on the rise –thefts increased by 6.5% last year compared to 2022– and with 526 people on the Mossos list of multiple repeat offenders who have accumulated a total of 6,169 crimes behind them , the Barcelona legal profession proposes that the theft of a mobile phone by itself goes up a notch in terms of its punishment and stops being considered a minor crime and becomes a less serious one, which carries penalties of one to three years in prison and could have a deterrent effect on criminals.
“It is true that a cell phone, when four days have passed, no longer has the same value as when you bought it, but in a cell phone you have your life, your privacy, your intimacy, you have everything. Furthermore, when you are a victim of theft you do not collect insurance. We propose that if the robbery is of a mobile phone, it should not be a minor crime, but rather a less serious one,” the dean of the College of Advocacy of Barcelona, Jesús Sánchez, told La Vanguardia.
The proposal is included in a broader approach to reform the Penal Code and toughen penalties for multiple repeat offenders after verifying that the modification approved in August 2022 is not working. That measure, the basis of which was the proposal of the Col·legi de l'Advocacia of Barcelona, drafted by the lawyer Emilio Zegrí, proposed punishing with a harsher penalty those who accumulated at least three minor crimes of theft. That minor crime, when repeated, became a less serious crime and could carry prison sentences. However, the text adopted by the PDECat and presented in Congress underwent modifications during the amendment process. The PSOE and the PNV introduced a new requirement to apply multiple recidivism: that the value of the three stolen objects exceeded 400 euros. That last-minute modification sought to guarantee, for example, that someone who had stolen three pieces of clothing worth 20 euros each or three loaves of bread from a supermarket would not end up with a prison sentence. The reality, however, has been that this change has represented an added obstacle to the already difficult mechanism of the administration of justice. To know if a person arrested for theft accumulates more thefts of this type, the court must review the criminal record sheet. There are previous convictions for theft, but the value of the stolen object does not appear, so the application of the aggravating factor of recidivism cannot be attributed immediately.
Thus, the court must ask the other courts to send it the old sentences in case they find the value of what was stolen and be able to apply the recidivism, which delays the entire process even more. Furthermore, it must be taken into account that theft records expire after six months, so if it takes that long to review previous crimes, the measure is ineffective. “This reform was full of good faith, but it did not take into account what daily legal practice is,” laments the dean. “Daily judicial practice is very slow, and although it seems that things work electronically, it is worth remembering that some courts still use faxes,” he adds.
Given this situation, the college proposes eliminating the requirement that the three crimes exceed 400 euros to apply the aggravating circumstance, as already established in the initiative they presented years ago, but they add a novelty: they empower the judge to remove the aggravating circumstance of multiple recidivism. if you consider it appropriate. If it is applied and the accused considers it unfair, “the lawyer will be the one to look for the previous sentences and the amounts and justify that the value of what was stolen was not excessive,” says the dean. The school's new proposal will be presented to society on March 5. The initiative arose after detecting the social concern that existed about the increase in petty crime in the city of Barcelona. “The political representatives asked us to do a study to analyze the situation and we have done so,” he reasons.
