Article 171 Spanish Criminal Code: Blackmail and Conditional Threats (2026)

Article 171 of the Spanish Criminal Code (CP) completes the system of threat offences. While article 169 punishes threatening harm that would itself be a crime, art. 171 CP covers conditional threats of non-criminal harm, blackmail — demanding money under threat of revealing private facts — and minor threats, with specific rules for gender and domestic violence. As criminal defence lawyers specialised in conditional threats and blackmail, we explain what each section punishes and where the lines of defence lie.

What Article 171 CP Punishes: A Map of the Provision

The article groups conduct of very different gravity:

• Art. 171.1 CP: the conditional threat of harm that does not amount to a crime, where the condition demanded is not something legally owed.
• Arts. 171.2 and 171.3 CP: blackmail (threat of disclosure), with a special rule where what the blackmailer threatens to reveal is an offence committed by the victim.
• Arts. 171.4 and 171.5 CP: minor threats in gender and domestic violence settings, including minor threats made with weapons.
• Art. 171.6 CP: a discretionary mitigation allowing the court to lower the sentence by one degree.
• Art. 171.7 CP: the residual minor offence of threats, prosecutable only upon complaint.

The first question in any defence is therefore one of classification: if the harm announced would itself be a crime — killing, injuring, burning property — the applicable provision is article 169 CP, with markedly higher penalties; if it would not, the case falls under art. 171 CP.

Art. 171.1 CP: Conditional Threats of Non-Criminal Harm

The offence requires three elements:

1. Announced harm that is not a crime: revealing compromising information, cutting off a professional relationship, spreading an embarrassing fact… The harm must be serious and credible, capable of bending the victim's will, even though carrying it out would not be a criminal act.
2. A condition attached: the offender makes the harm depend on the victim doing or refraining from doing something ("agree, or I tell everyone").
3. The condition must not be conduct legally owed: if what is demanded is something the victim is legally obliged to do, the conduct falls outside this offence.

The penalty is 3 months to 1 year in prison or a fine of 6 to 24 months, depending on the gravity and circumstances of the act. If the offender achieves their aim, the penalty is imposed in its upper half: success aggravates the sentence, just as it does under art. 169.

Art. 171.2 CP: Blackmail (Threat of Disclosure)

Section 2 defines blackmail in the strict sense: demanding money or a reward from another person under threat of revealing or spreading facts about their private life or family relationships that are not publicly known and could damage their reputation, credit or interests. It carries the heaviest penalties in the article:

• 2 to 4 years in prison if the offender obtains all or part of what was demanded.
• 4 months to 2 years in prison if not.

The defence must examine whether there was a genuine financial demand (money or a reward), whether the facts belong to the private sphere and were not already public, and whether they were capable of harming the complainant's reputation or interests. In practice this offence overlaps with phenomena such as sextortion and threats to publish intimate images, where other provisions may also apply. We analyse these scenarios on our page on the offence of blackmail.

Art. 171.3 CP: When the Threat Is to Reveal a Crime

What if what the blackmailer threatens to reveal or report is a crime committed by the blackmail victim? Spanish law wants victims to be able to go to the police without automatically incriminating themselves: art. 171.3 CP allows the Public Prosecutor to refrain from prosecuting the offence whose disclosure was threatened, in order to make it easier to punish the blackmail itself. The rule has a limit: it does not apply where that offence carries more than 2 years' imprisonment; in that case, the court may reduce its penalty by one or two degrees. For foreign nationals being blackmailed in Spain, this provision is often the key that unlocks the decision to report.

Arts. 171.4 and 171.5 CP: Minor Threats in Gender and Domestic Violence

Minor threats — intimidating remarks of lesser gravity — stop being the minor offence of art. 171.7 CP and become punishable with prison when they occur within a couple or a family. The Criminal Code splits this ground into two provisions: art. 171.4 CP looks at who the victim is (the offender's wife or former partner, or an especially vulnerable person living with him), while art. 171.5 CP looks at the means used (weapons or other dangerous instruments) against the remaining persons listed in art. 173.2 CP. Both sections share the same aggravation clause and, as a counterweight, art. 171.6 CP lets the court, giving reasons in the judgment and considering the offender's personal circumstances and those of the act, impose the penalty one degree lower.

Art. 171.4 CP: Minor Threats Against a Wife, Former Partner or Especially Vulnerable Person

Who can be the victim. Section 4 punishes anyone who threatens in a minor way a woman who is or has been his wife, or a woman who is or has been linked to him by a similar emotional relationship even without cohabitation. Neither cohabitation nor a subsisting relationship is required: former partners fall squarely within the offence. A second paragraph widens the protected circle — the same penalty applies to a minor threat against an especially vulnerable person who lives with the offender — and in that variant cohabitation is an element of the offence.

Penalty. The wording in force imposes six months to one year in prison or 31 to 80 days of community service and, in every case, deprivation of the right to own and carry weapons for one year and one day to three years, together with special disqualification from exercising parental authority, guardianship, curatorship, custody or foster care for up to five years where the court considers it appropriate in the interest of the minor or the person with a disability in need of special protection. Two points matter: prison and community service are alternatives, and the weapons ban applies in every case, even where no weapon was involved in the threat.

Aggravation: the upper half. The penalties under sections 4 and 5 are imposed in their upper half where the offence is committed in the presence of minors, takes place in the shared home or in the victim's home, or is committed in breach of a penalty listed in art. 48 CP or an equivalent precautionary or security measure. That last scenario — a threat made while a restraining order is in force — may additionally amount to a separate offence of breach.

Difference from art. 171.7 CP. The same words addressed to someone outside the circles of sections 4 and 5 would be the minor offence of art. 171.7 CP: a fine of 1 to 3 months, prosecutable only upon complaint by the aggrieved person or their legal representative. Under art. 171.4 CP the conduct is punishable with prison and that complaint requirement does not apply. This is why the defence so often argues over classification before arguing over the facts: the distance between a fine and a prison sentence lies in which section is applied.

In these cases the courtroom battle usually turns on the real intimidating force of the words used: the Supreme Court has confirmed that without objectively intimidating conduct there is no offence, as we explained when commenting on the Supreme Court ruling on minor threats in gender violence cases.

Art. 171.5 CP: Minor Threats Made With Weapons or Dangerous Instruments

Who can be the victim. Section 5 punishes anyone who threatens in a minor way, with weapons or other dangerous instruments, any of the persons referred to in art. 173.2 CP, except those covered by section 4. That circle covers the spouse or a person who is or has been linked by a similar emotional relationship even without cohabitation; descendants, ascendants and siblings by blood, adoption or affinity, whether the offender's own or the spouse's or cohabitant's; minors or persons with a disability in need of special protection who live with the offender or are subject to the parental authority, guardianship, curatorship, foster care or de facto custody of the spouse or cohabitant; anyone integrated into the family household through any other relationship; and persons who, because of their particular vulnerability, are held in the care or custody of public or private institutions. Victims covered by section 4 are excluded and fall under the previous provision.

Penalty. The wording in force imposes three months to one year in prison or 31 to 80 days of community service and, in every case, deprivation of the right to own and carry weapons for one to three years, together with special disqualification from exercising parental authority, guardianship, curatorship, custody or foster care for six months to three years where the court considers it appropriate in the interest of the minor or the person with a disability in need of special protection. The prison range is lower than under section 4, but the weapons ban is again mandatory.

Aggravation: the upper half. The same clause as in section 4 applies: the penalty is imposed in its upper half where the offence is committed in the presence of minors, takes place in the shared home or in the victim's home, or is committed in breach of a penalty listed in art. 48 CP or an equivalent precautionary or security measure.

Difference from art. 171.7 CP. What separates the two provisions is the means used. A minor threat against a person listed in art. 173.2 CP made without any weapon or dangerous instrument falls under the second paragraph of art. 171.7 CP, punished with permanent localisation for 5 to 30 days — always at an address different from and away from the victim's —, community service for 5 to 30 days or a fine of 1 to 4 months (the fine only where the circumstances of art. 84.2 CP are met), and no prior complaint is required. Producing a knife or any object capable of endangering the victim moves the same words into art. 171.5 CP, with prison. And if the harm announced with the weapon would itself be a crime, the classification shifts to art. 169 CP.

Art. 171.7 CP: The Minor Offence of Threats

Outside all the above cases, anyone who threatens another person in a minor way commits a minor offence punished with a fine of 1 to 3 months. It is prosecutable only upon complaint by the aggrieved person or their legal representative: without a complaint there is no case.

Where the victim belongs to the family circle of art. 173.2 CP, the penalty changes: permanent localisation for 5 to 30 days — always at an address different from and away from the victim's —, community service for 5 to 30 days or a fine of 1 to 4 months, the fine being available only where the circumstances of art. 84.2 CP are met. In these family cases no prior complaint is required.

Defence Strategies Against an Art. 171 CP Charge

1. Challenging the seriousness of the threat: heated remarks made in the middle of an argument, with no real will to cause harm and no capacity to intimidate, do not satisfy the offence.
2. Attacking the classification: the sentencing gap between art. 169 (criminal harm) and art. 171.1 (non-criminal harm), or between art. 171.4 and the minor offence of art. 171.7, is substantial; the defence must push for the correct fit.
3. The condition as conduct legally owed: under art. 171.1, if what was demanded was legally due, the conduct falls outside the offence.
4. In blackmail cases, disputing the elements: no demand for money or a reward, facts that were already public, or facts incapable of damaging the complainant's reputation, credit or interests.
5. Reviewing the evidence: with threats sent by messaging apps and social media, authorship, context and exact wording can all be contested. The distinction from coercion under article 172 CP — which requires present violence rather than the announcement of future harm — can also change the classification.