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How Judges Are Bound by the Legal Definition of the Crime

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Multilevel Protection of the Principle of Legality in Criminal Law

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Abstract

In the late 1990s, Spanish constitutional case-law developed a carefully constructed doctrine establishing that, as part of the legality principle, judges are bound by the legal definition of the crime. The classic dilemma concerning the boundary between legitimate and necessary judicial interpretation, on the one hand, and the proscribed judicial creation of offences and penalties, on the other (Sect. 2). That constitutional canon was welcomed greatly by the doctrine, but raised some partial controversy and left other points for development (3). The aim in this work is to shed light on both aspects—to explain that controversy and to advance in the canon—and it will to do so in two jurisdictions of human rights: that of the European Court, which is binding upon us (4), and that of the Inter-American Court, whose enlightenment will be compared and will move us to emulation (5).

Former Law Clerk at the Spanish Constitutional Court (1994–1998; 2004–2009), Professor of Criminal Law at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    As reflected in the same STC 137/1997, “[t]his respect does not always guarantee a sanctioning decision in accordance with the essential guarantees of legal certainty or the interdiction of arbitrariness, as, among other factors, the language is relatively vague and versatile, the regulations are necessarily abstract and refer implicitly to a standardized underlying reality, and within certain limits (among others, STC 111/1993), the legislator himself can strengthen that malleability to facilitate the tuning of the norm to reality (as in judgement STC 62/1982; and more recently, STC 53/1994)” (FJ 7).

  2. 2.

    On the inconveniences of this criteria, Ortiz de Urbina Gimeno (2012), p. 202.

  3. 3.

    Also, SSTC 110/2000 of 5 May 2000, FJ 5; 88/2003 of 19 May 2003, FJ 8.

  4. 4.

    See, ECtHR Judgement of 15 March 2011, c. Otegi Mondragón v. Spain, par. 59.

  5. 5.

    STC 104/2011 of 20 June 2011, FJ 6, in relation to the right to strike. See also STC 136/1999 of 20 July 1999, FJ 29 c, in relation to the disproportionate nature of the punishment of the crime of collaboration with a terrorist organization for a political party that had issued a video of that organization.

  6. 6.

    Neither expressed in the Spanish Constitution, nor implicit, by the way, in the prohibition of unfavourable retroactivity (see Lascuraín Sánchez 2000, p. 55 ff).

  7. 7.

    For these and other reasons Guzmán Dalbora qualifies it as “defective and uninspiring” (Guzmán Dalbora 2010, p. 172).

  8. 8.

    “Nobody can be convicted or sanctioned…”: as the sanction is also a conviction and the punishment is a sanction, it appears that it might have been better to refer only to a sentenced person.

  9. 9.

    IACtHR Judgement of 2 February 2001, Case of Baena-Ricardo et al. v. Panama, par. 106; IACtHR Judgement of 31 August 2004, Case of Ricardo Canese v. Paraguay, par. 176.

  10. 10.

    IACtHR Judgement of 18 November 2004, Case of De la Cruz-Flores v. Peru, par. 82; IACtHR Judgement of 25 November 2005, Case of García-Asto and Ramírez-Rojas v. Peru, par. 190; IACtHR Judgement of 6 May 2008, Case of Yvon Neptune v. Haiti, par. 125; IACtHR Judgement of 27 April 2012, Case of Pacheco Teruel v. Honduras, par. 105; IACtHR Judgement of 23 November 2012, Case of Mohamed v. Argentina, par. 132; IACtHR Judgement of 30 January 2014, Case of Liakat Ali Alibux v. Suriname, par. 61.

  11. 11.

    However much the reason was the “reconversion of the island of Coiba, from a Prison Centre into an ecological tourist site” and even though the criminal norm had subsequently been repealed that foresaw deprivation of freedom for conducts such as those of the appellant (IACtHR Judgement of 23 November 2010, Case of Vélez Loor v. Panama, par. 186 and 18).

  12. 12.

    IACtHR Judgement of 18 November 2004, Case of De la Cruz-Flores v. Peru, par. 88, 102.

  13. 13.

    IACtHR Judgement of 18 November 2004, Case of De la Cruz-Flores v. Peru, par. 88, 95, 101.

  14. 14.

    IACtHR Judgement of 25 November 2005, Case of García-Asto and Ramírez-Rojas v. Peru, par. 200. See, in a similar sense, STC 13/2003 of 28 January 2003.

  15. 15.

    IACtHR Judgement of 25 November 2005, Case of García-Asto and Ramírez-Rojas v. Peru, par. 201.

  16. 16.

    IACtHR Judgement of 18 November 2004, Case of De la Cruz-Flores v. Peru, par. 88; IACtHR Judgement of 25 November 2005, Case of García-Asto and Ramírez-Rojas v. Peru, par. 201.

  17. 17.

    IACtHR Judgement of 23 November 2012, Case of Mohamed v. Argentina, par. 132.

  18. 18.

    Not pleaded, but invoked by the Court itself “in the light of the Inter-American Convention and based on the principle of iura novit curia” (IACtHR Judgement of 2 May 2008, Case of Kimel v. Argentina, par. 61; IACtHR Judgement of 20 November 2009, Case of Usón Ramírez v. Venezuela, par. 53).

  19. 19.

    IACtHR Judgement of 2 May 2008, Case of Kimel v. Argentina, par. 66. In the Case of Venezuela, “Article 505 of the Organic Code of Military Justice does not strictly limit the elements of the criminal behavior, nor does it consider the existence of injury, resulting in a codification that is too vague and ambiguous in its formulation to comply with the legality requirements of Article 9 of the Convention” (IACtHR Judgement of 20 November 2009, Case of Usón Ramírez v. Venezuela, par. 57).

  20. 20.

    On the matter, Lascuraín Sánchez (2002), p. 59.

  21. 21.

    IACtHR Judgement of 2 May 2008, Case of Kimel v. Argentina, par. 78. Also, in similar terms IACtHR Judgement of 20 November 2009, Case of Usón Ramírez v. Venezuela, par. 67.

  22. 22.

    Although it should be remembered that the same article 7 that firmly proclaimed the principle of legality relativizes its content. Under section 2, it affirms that “This Article shall not prejudice the trial and punishment of any person for any act or omission which, at the time when it was committed, was criminal according to the general principles of law recognised by civilised nations”. The Court itself has emphasized that we face an “essential element of the rule of law”, that “occupies a prominent place in the Convention system of protection, as is underlined by the fact that no derogation from it is permissible under Article 15 in time of war or other public emergency” [ECtHR (GC) Judgement of 22 February 2013, c. Streletz, Kessler and Krenz v. Germany, par. 50].

  23. 23.

    Murphy (2010), pp. 1, 15, 16. http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1513623.

  24. 24.

    Huerta Tocildo (2014), pp. 399–427.

  25. 25.

    See, for example the manual of Simester et al. (2013): “Today, English criminal law is no longer predominantly the result of judicial creativity, but is primarily enacted through parliamentary statutes and subordinate regulations. There are, it seems, over 10,000 different criminal offences on the statute books, by far the most important source of criminal law” (p. 46). On the same page, the tendency to codification and some up until now, failed attempts to carry it out.

  26. 26.

    LaFave points out that this practice was stopped in the mid-19th c. although he notes that in Rex v. Manley (1933) a crime was devised (termed public mischief) of false accusation. It points out that only rarely will an “offence” be created and that in no case would it be a serious crime or a felony. In the United States, the tendency to abolish common law crimes and to move towards codification is clearer. In any case, it is well founded that federal crimes cannot exist through such channels (LaFave 2009, pp. 74 ff.).

  27. 27.

    See, Ormerod (2009), pp. 1, 7.

  28. 28.

    Kuhlen (2012), pp. 163 ff.

  29. 29.

    See, on this Huerta Tocildo (2014), p. 218; Scoletta (2010), p. 259.

  30. 30.

    ECtHR Judgement of 10 October 2006, c. Pessino v. France, par. 29.

  31. 31.

    As “due to the principle of the generality of laws, their texts cannot be of an absolute precision […] Also, numerous laws make use of the force of more or less imprecise aspects of formulas, in order to avoid an excessive rigidity and to be able to adapt themselves to changes of situation” (ECtHR Judgement of 24 May 2007, c. Dragotoniu and Militaru-Pidhorni v. Romania, par. 36; ECtHR Judgement of 6 October 2011, c. Soros v. France, par. 51). In this respect, Judgement STC 137/1997 of 21 July 1997, FJ 7).

  32. 32.

    ECtHR Judgement of 22 November 1995, c. C. R. v. the United Kingdom, par. 34; ECtHR Judgement of 22 November 1995, c. S. W. v. the United Kingdom, par. 36; ECtHR Judgement of 10 October 2010, c. Pessino v. France, 10.10.06, par. 19; ECtHR Judgement of 24 May 2007, c. Dragotoniu and Militaru-Pidhorni v. Romania, par. 37; ECtHR Judgement of 25 June 2009, c. Liivik v. Estonia, par. 94.

  33. 33.

    ECtHR Judgement of 25 June 1993, c. Kokkinakis v. Greece, par. 52; ECtHR Judgement of 22 November 1995, c. C. R. v. the United Kingdom, par. 33; ECtHR Judgement of 10 October 2010, c. Pessino v. France, 10.10.06, par. 28; ECtHR Judgement of 24 May 2007, c. Dragotoniu and Militaru-Pidhorni v. Romania, par. 33; ECtHR Judgement of 25 June 2009, c. Liivik v. Estonia, par. 92.

  34. 34.

    See, in this respect Montiel (2009), p. 130.

  35. 35.

    This is the meaning that Scoletta attributes to the use of the adjective in the European Court, from which he infers a restrictive requirement of interpretation of criminal law (Scoletta 2010, p. 270). The Spanish Constitutional Law also uses the expressions with ambiguity: “application analogical or extensive in malam partem” (STC 137/1997, FJ 7).

  36. 36.

    Scoletta points out that European case-law does not insist on the principles-measure and it does on the final result of the cognoscibility of criminal law (Scoletta 2010, p. 259).

  37. 37.

    Not many. As Huerta Tocildo affirms “the same notion of foreseeability apparently destined to compensate the lack of a requirement of the absolute reserve of Law in criminal matters has not up until now been the object of excessive specifications” (Huerta Tocildo 2014, pp. 404 and ff.).

  38. 38.

    Thus, Huerta Tocildo (2014), p. 405.

  39. 39.

    ECtHR Judgement of 22 November 1995, c. S. W. v. the United Kingdom, par. 43; ECtHR Judgement of 25 June 2009, c. Liivik v. Estonia, par. 94.

  40. 40.

    ECtHR Judgement of 22 October 1996, c. Cantoni v. France, par. 30 and ff.; ECtHR Judgement of 6 October 2011, c. Soros v. France, par. 57. See, Scoletta (2010), p. 271.

  41. 41.

    ECtHR Judgement of 22 October 1996, c. Cantoni v. France, par. 32.

  42. 42.

    ECtHR Judgement of 22 October 1996, c. Cantoni v. France, par. 33; ECtHR Judgement of 10 October 2010, c. Pessino v. France, 10.10.06, par. 33; ECtHR Judgement of 24 May 2007, c. Dragotoniu and Militaru-Pidhorni v. Romania, par. 35.

  43. 43.

    ECtHR Judgement of 10 October 2010, c. Pessino v. France, 10.10.06, par. 33; ECtHR Judgement of 24 May 2007, c. Dragotoniu and Militaru-Pidhorni v. Romania, par. 35.

  44. 44.

    ECtHR Judgement of 10 October 2010, c. Pessino v. France, 10.10.06, par. 29; ECtHR Judgement of 12 February 2008, c. Kafkaris v. Cyprus, par. 140.

  45. 45.

    See Mururphy (2010), p. 9.

  46. 46.

    ECtHR Judgement of 20 January 2009, c. Fondi v. Italy, par. 116. The case originally judged was an urbanistic crime. See Grandi (2010), p. 218; Scoletta (2010), p. 278.

  47. 47.

    ECtHR Judgement of 25 June 2009, c. Liivik v. Estonia, par. 99.

  48. 48.

    ECtHR Judgement of 24 May 2007, c. Dragotoniu and Militaru-Pidhorni v. Romania, par. 43.

  49. 49.

    ECtHR Judgement of 14 March, c. Kasymakhunov and Saybatalov v. Russia, par. 92, 94.

  50. 50.

    ECtHR Judgement of 22 November 1995, c. S. W. v. the United Kingdom, par. 40, 41, 42.

  51. 51.

    ECtHR (GC) Judgement of 22 February 2013, c. Streletz, Kessler and Krenz v. Germany, par. 69, 78; ECtHR Judgement of 22 March 2001, c. K. H. W. v. Germany, par. 68, 71.

  52. 52.

    Critically, Murphy (2010), p. 5: the criminal order of the Democratic Republic of Germany cannot be analyzed without taking into account the causes of exemption of responsibility.

  53. 53.

    ECtHR Judgement of 22 March 2001, c. K. H. W. v. Germany, par. 90.

  54. 54.

    Thus, Murphy (2010), p. 5. See also Scoletta (2010), p. 264.

  55. 55.

    The judge Cabral Barreto.

  56. 56.

    ECtHR Judgement of 6 October 2011, c. Soros v. France, par. 54 and ff. (non-official translation). Three of the eight judges dissented with the judgement, “as neither the opinion of a jurist nor the Case-law analysis would have permitted the appellant to see clearly that the activities that were projected were prohibited upon the basis of the applicable legislation at the time”.

  57. 57.

    In the German example, Case-law rather than no Case law: the absence of criminal prosecution for acts such as those that were judged.

  58. 58.

    Although it was affirmed in the judgement of Dragotoniu and Militaru-Pidhorni v. Romania that “as a corollary of the principle of the legality of convictions, the provisions of criminal law are subjected to the principle of strict interpretation” (ECtHR Judgement of 24 May 2007, par. 40).

  59. 59.

    In relation to constitutional control, Alcácer Guirao pointed out quite rightly that the extensive interpretation cannot form part of such control because it would lead the Constitutional Court to have to determine the correct interpretation of criminal law and because it is neither well coupled with the canon of foreseeability nor with the grounding of legal safety (Alcácer Guirao 2011, pp. 362 and ff.).

  60. 60.

    On this point, Schabas (2010), p. 410.

  61. 61.

    See. Schabas (2010), p. 410.

  62. 62.

    On this point, Schabas (2010), p. 410.

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  1. Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Campus UAM, 28049, Madrid, Spain

    Juan Antonio Lascuraín Sánchez

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  1. Faculty of Law, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Mercedes Pérez Manzano

  2. Faculty of Law, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Juan Antonio Lascuraín Sánchez

  3. Faculty of Law, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Marina Mínguez Rosique

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Lascuraín Sánchez, J.A. (2018). How Judges Are Bound by the Legal Definition of the Crime. In: Pérez Manzano, M., Lascuraín Sánchez, J., Mínguez Rosique, M. (eds) Multilevel Protection of the Principle of Legality in Criminal Law. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-63865-2_4

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