The mitigation of drunkenness or alcohol intoxication in criminal law

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Committing a crime with the intellectual and volitional faculties affected by alcohol consumption can give rise to various situations depending on the degree of alcohol intoxication that occurs, and all of them have the consequence of reducing the criminal punishment. However, it is not easy to determine when this circumstance can lead to the perpetrator of the crime being exempt from liability and when it acts only by mitigating the penalty. In this article we are going to analyze the different assumptions that can arise from the assessment of drunkenness related to the commission of the crime. We can help you At Dexia Abogados we are lawyers specializing in criminal law in Madrid . If you need a criminal law firm with extensive experience, contact us and find out without obligation . CONTACT US What is meant by drunkenness and how does it affect criminal liability? Drunkenness is identified with alcohol intoxication, and means that the drunk person is under the influence of alcohol and has impaired understanding and willpower.

For this reason, drunkenness is considered a modifying circumstance of criminal responsibility , in this case mitigating , and can even exempt from all guilt the person who acts seriously affected by it. After previous versions of our Penal Code, in which occasional drunkenness was contemplated as the only possible way to mitigate criminal responsibility, probably with the intention of morally punishing habitual drunkenness, the current regulation DM Databases is much more objective and removed from considerations morals, and includes different degrees and forms of alcohol intoxication when determining the responsibility of the subject in the criminal act. Thus, article 20.2 establishes the assumption of a complete defense of drunkenness, which must be taken as a basis to determine the scope of the possible mitigating circumstances applicable for this reason. They are exempt from criminal liability Anyone who, at the time of committing the criminal.



Offense, is in a state of full intoxication due to the consumption of alcoholic beverages, toxic drugs, narcotics, psychotropic substances or others that produce similar effects, provided that he or she has not been searched for the purpose of commit it or his commission was not foreseen or should not have been foreseen, or is under the influence of a withdrawal syndrome, due to his dependence on such substances, which prevents him from understanponsibility, including: The so-called incomplete defense (article 2which is treated differently from the rest of the mitigating circumstances: “The causes expressed in the previous chapter, when all the necessary requirements to exempt from liability in their respective cases are not met” . The mitigating circumstance of serious addiction (article“That of the guilty party acting because of his serious addiction to the substances mentioned in number 2.º of the previous article” (referring to the complete defense of drunkenness or intoxication by substances.