Traffic

The Supreme Court (TS) has confirmed aconvicting sentence against a person who committed atraffic offense by driving under the influence ofalcohol and, in addition, doing so without adriving license, because it had already been revoked after a previous conviction. The accused was caught driving in Móstoles without a license and with a very high alcohol level in exhaled air (almosttwice the legal limit). Furthermore, he ran a red light and showed clear signs of intoxication.

He hadbeen convicted several times in previous years for similar offenses and those convictions were still "active", meaning that thelegal deadline to have them removed from his record had not been reached. That's why the judges applied the aggravating factor of "multiple reoffending"Multiple reoffending", something like saying that it is not the first time he commits the offense.

The court of first instance and the Provincial Court imposed several penalties,prison, a longsuspension of the driver's license(when he can get it back), and afine; all this, taking into account both the relapse and the seriousness of the behavior (very high alcohol rate and constant disobedience to traffic rules). The accused appealed several times, even before the Supreme Court, but it has reminded him that it is not enough to raise objections to the initial sentence, it is necessary toquestion the arguments in depth. It also emphasizes that in order toassess relapse it is enough to see that not enough time has passed since his previous convictions for them to disappear from his record.

In short, the Supreme Court concludes that, in these cases, relapse and theseriousness of the offense justify a firm penal response. It also makes clear thatprevious convictions of this kind cannot be "erased" if one continues to commit offenses before the required period established by law has elapsed.