Fifteen people acquitted of Social Security fraud charges due to excessive judicial delay
Judges in Vila do Conde freed defendants who waited 13 years for a verdict, ruling that the State failed in its duty to ensure procedural promptness.
Fifteen people acquitted of Social Security fraud charges due to excessive judicial delay
A court in northern Portugal ruled in favour of 15 defendants in a fraud case against the social protection system. The judges did not question the existence of evidence, but instead found that the waiting period — approximately a decade and three years from initial detection to final ruling — constituted an unacceptable breach of the right to speedy resolution.
This guarantee is enshrined in both the nation's fundamental law and the European treaty safeguarding civil liberties. The amount in question was around 500,000 euros in unemployment benefits and early pensions obtained unlawfully. The investigation was part of a broader network of suspected irregularities totalling 15 million euros.
The chronology reveals several gaps. The social security management body identified irregularities in May 2012. This was followed by nearly three years of administrative silence until March 2015. Another interval of more than two years passed without action. Only at the end of 2017 did the first formal complaint emerge.
Between early 2018 and September 2019, again nothing was recorded. The prosecution authority in Matosinhos only received the case file in October 2021, formalising the charges in September 2023. Some of the investigated persons were notified as suspects with minimal time before the statute of limitations — one woman in particular with only 48 hours' notice.
After preliminary proceedings and an interruption due to a judge's health issues, the verdict was handed down in July 2026. The defence teams were not identified as responsible for any delays.
Even without the statute of limitations being exhausted, the panel found that the gravity of the charges imposes temporal barriers to the State's punitive action, beyond mere legal prescriptions.
Source: ECO
Source: Google News PT — Crime (pt)