Organic Law 5/2000: Juvenile Criminal Liability Explained

Organic Law 5/2000, of 12 January, regulating the criminal liability of minors (LORPM, its Spanish acronym; BOE-A-2000-641) is the law that applies when an offence is committed by someone aged fourteen to seventeen. It does not amend the articles of the Criminal Code (CP): it creates a separate regime, with measures instead of penalties and an investigation led by the Public Prosecutor’s Office (Ministerio Fiscal) rather than by a judge. In force since 13 January 2001, it is implemented by a Regulation approved by Royal Decree 1774/2004. Its consolidated text is published in the Official State Gazette (BOE), and our criminal law reforms section places it among the other key statutes.

What Organic Law 5/2000 is and how it is structured

Its sixty-four articles follow the order of the proceedings:

Its guiding principle is the best interests of the child: the judge chooses the measure having regard above all to the minor’s age, family and social circumstances, personality and interests (Art. 7.3 LORPM).

Who it applies to: the 14-to-18 age bracket

Art. 1.1 LORPM applies it to anyone who commits an offence after turning fourteen and before turning eighteen, and Art. 19 CP refers anyone under eighteen to it.

• Children under fourteen. They are not liable under this law: the child protection rules apply, and the Prosecutor informs the regional child protection authority (Art. 3 LORPM).
• Ages fourteen to seventeen. Organic Law 5/2000 applies, with different limits for the fourteen-to-fifteen and sixteen-to-seventeen age bands (Art. 10 LORPM).
• From eighteen. The CP applies. Organic Law 8/2006 abolished the original extension to young adults over eighteen and under twenty-one, although Art. 69 CP still mentions it.

What counts is the age at the time of the events: turning eighteen before or during the proceedings does not change the jurisdiction of the juvenile judges and prosecutors (Art. 5.3 LORPM).

The measures in Art. 7: what the judge can impose

Organic Law 5/2000 does not impose penalties but measures, which are both punitive and educational in nature. Art. 7.1 LORPM lists them from the most to the least restrictive of rights:

Placement has two periods, the first in the centre and the second under supervised release (Art. 7.2 LORPM), and for the sexual assaults in Chapters I and II of Title VIII of the CP, sex education and equality programmes are always added (Art. 7.5 LORPM). Under the accusatorial principle, the judge cannot exceed the measure requested by the prosecution or, for custodial measures, the prison term an adult would have received (Art. 8 LORPM). More detail in our overview of the juvenile criminal liability law.

How long the measures last, by age (Arts. 9 to 11)

As a general rule, no measure may exceed two years, one hundred hours of community service or eight weekends (Art. 9.3 LORPM). Closed placement requires a serious offence (grave: one carrying a serious penalty, such as more than five years in prison, Arts. 13 and 33 CP), a less serious offence (menos grave) committed with violence, intimidation or serious risk to life or physical integrity, or an offence committed in a group or for a gang or organisation, and it is never available for negligent acts (Arts. 9.2 and 9.4 LORPM).

In those cases the limits rise with age (Art. 10.1 LORPM), and for the most serious offences closed placement is mandatory: homicide and murder, the sexual assaults in Arts. 178.2 and 3, 179, 180 and 181.2, 4, 5 and 6 CP, the other offences listed in that provision and any offence punishable by fifteen years’ imprisonment or more (Art. 10.2 LORPM).

For faltas (the petty offences abolished in 2015, which Organic Law 1/2015 says procedural laws must read as minor offences, or delitos leves), only short measures are possible, such as up to six months of supervised release, four weekends, fifty hours of community service or a formal warning (Art. 9.1 LORPM).

What happens when the minor turns eighteen (Art. 14)

Turning eighteen does not interrupt the measure (Art. 14.1 LORPM). If closed placement remains to be served and the young person is not meeting the objectives of the judgment, the judge may order it to be completed in prison; at twenty-one that transfer is the rule, unless the judge exceptionally decides otherwise (Art. 14.2 and 3 LORPM).

A dedicated process: the Prosecutor investigates, the Juvenile Section tries

The investigation is led by the Public Prosecutor’s Office, through the juvenile section of each provincial prosecutor’s office (Fiscalía de Menores), and not by an investigating judge (Arts. 6 and 16 LORPM); only a judge can authorise steps that restrict fundamental rights (Art. 23.3 LORPM). The case is tried by the Juvenile Section of the Court of Instance (Sección de Menores), which replaced the Juvenile Courts (Juzgados de Menores) under Organic Law 1/2025.

• Arrest. Within a maximum of twenty-four hours, the minor must be released or handed over to the Prosecutor, who decides within forty-eight hours of the arrest; the parents must be told immediately (Art. 17 LORPM). Our guide for parents covers each step.
• Case file. Right to a lawyer, to a private interview before making a statement and to take part in the investigation (Art. 22 LORPM).
• Technical team. The equipo técnico, made up of psychologists, educators and social workers who advise the judge and the Prosecutor, reports on the minor’s psychological, educational, family and social situation within ten days, extendable to one month (Art. 27 LORPM).
• Interim measures. Placement, supervised release, a ban on approaching the victim, or living with another person or an educational group. Interim placement lasts up to six months, extendable by three, and counts towards the final measure (Art. 28 LORPM).
• Hearing. After the Prosecutor’s written charges (escrito de alegaciones, Art. 30), the hearing may be held in private, and the media may never publish images or details that identify the minor (Art. 35.2 LORPM).
• Plea agreement (conformidad). If the prosecution seeks measures other than placement (letters e to ñ of Art. 7.1) and the minor, their lawyer and those civilly liable agree, judgment is given without a trial (Art. 32 LORPM); at the hearing, the judge asks the minor whether they admit the acts and accept the measures (Art. 36).
• Judgment and appeals. Judgment within five days (Art. 38); appeal to the Provincial Court (Audiencia Provincial) within five days (Art. 41); and, if a measure under Art. 10 was imposed, an appeal to the Supreme Court to unify case law (Art. 42 LORPM).

Mediation and reparation: alternatives to the process

With discontinuance (desistimiento), the Prosecutor may decide not to open a file for a less serious offence committed without violence or intimidation, or a falta, unless the minor has committed similar acts before; the case then goes to child protection (Art. 18 LORPM). With conciliation or reparation, for less serious offences or faltas and above all where there was no serious violence or intimidation, the Prosecutor may drop the case if the minor has apologised to the victim and the apology has been accepted, or has undertaken to repair the harm or to complete the educational activity proposed by the technical team, which acts as mediator; once that is done, the Prosecutor asks the judge to close the case (Art. 19 LORPM).

Since Organic Law 10/2022, for the sexual assaults in Chapters I and II of Title VIII of the CP and in cases related to gender violence, conciliation only has effect if the victim expressly requests it and the minor has completed the sex education and equality measure (Art. 19.2 LORPM). We compare this with the adult system in restorative justice and victim-offender mediation.

When offences and measures become time-barred (Art. 15)

Except for the most serious offences, the periods are shorter than those of the CP, summarised in our guide to the statute of limitations for crimes in Spain.

The measures imposed also become time-barred: after three years for those lasting more than two years; after one year for a formal warning, community service and weekend detention; and after two years for all the others (Art. 15.2 LORPM).

Enforcement of the measures and the register

Measures are enforced only once the judgment is final (Art. 43 LORPM), by the autonomous communities (Spain’s regional governments) and the cities of Ceuta and Melilla (Art. 45), under the juvenile judge’s supervision (Art. 44). A measure of up to two years can be suspended for up to two years (Art. 40), and the judge may reduce or replace it in the minor’s interest, within the limits of Art. 10 (Arts. 13 and 51). Judgments, interim measures, wanted notices and declarations of default are recorded in the Central Register of Minors (third additional provision, as worded by Organic Law 4/2024), in operation since 8 November 2025.

What the law changed and how it has been amended

Organic Law 5/2000 repealed the 1948 juvenile courts legislation, as amended by Organic Law 4/1992, and replaced a paternalistic guardianship model with one of responsibility backed by procedural safeguards. Its main amendments:

The latest attempt, a government bill (file 121/000041) under which the juvenile judge, rather than the Prosecutor, would verify the age of a detained person when there were reasonable doubts, lapsed on 6 October 2026 when the Cortes Generales (the Spanish Parliament) were dissolved (Royal Decree 806/2026); it would have to be reintroduced in the new legislature.

What it means today for the minor, the family or the victim

For the minor, procedural safeguards and a reasoned decision on the measure (Arts. 7.3 and 17 LORPM).

For the parents, direct financial liability: they, guardians, foster carers and custodians, in that order, are jointly and severally liable with the minor for the compensation, although the judge may reduce it if they did not encourage the conduct intentionally or through gross negligence (Art. 61.3 LORPM).

For the victim, the right to act as private prosecutor (acusación particular), a party alongside the Prosecutor (Art. 25 LORPM), and the civil claim, which the Prosecutor brings unless the victim waives it, reserves it for the civil courts or brings it personally within one month of being notified of the separate civil liability file (Art. 61.1). If the victim is under fourteen or has a disability requiring special protection, the Prosecutor must ask for their statement to be recorded in advance as pre-constituted evidence (Art. 23.4 LORPM).

Lines of defence

• The age on the date of the events, which decides which law and which limits apply (Arts. 1, 3 and 5.3 LORPM).
• Whether the facts fit Art. 9.2, without which closed placement is not possible.
• The ceiling in Art. 8: no more than the measure requested and no longer than an adult’s prison term.

What to do (and what not to do) if this law affects you

If your child is under investigation: do not let them make a statement without a lawyer, even if you are told it is a formality; gather school, medical or social reports for the technical team; and do not contact the victim yourselves, as mediation is the technical team’s job (Art. 19.3 LORPM).

If you are the victim of a minor: report it to the police or the juvenile section of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, ask for a medical report if there are injuries, and decide early whether to join the proceedings as private prosecutor.

At Alonso Sala, with more than 15 years of experience in criminal law, we act in juvenile justice proceedings both for minors and as private prosecutor for victims. You can also use our juvenile criminal liability checker for a first orientation.