Criminal law
Published on 17 September 2026
For a foreign resident, the question that arrives with a criminal case is rarely about the sentence. It is whether this will cost them the right to stay. That question has an answer, and it is more precise than the fear behind it.
Two procedures are running, on different clocks, before different authorities, and what you do in one has consequences in the other. Treating them as a single conversation is how avoidable problems become permanent ones.
Not when you are arrested. Not when you are summoned. Not while you are an investigado under investigation.
A criminal record arises from a conviction. Everything before that point is a procedure, not a record. This matters because people volunteer information they do not have to give, on the assumption that an open case is already a stain.
It also means a case that ends in dismissal, acquittal, or one that never proceeds beyond the investigation, leaves no record behind. A conformidad, by contrast, produces a conviction, which is why the two decisions are connected.
The law treats two situations very differently, and most of the confusion comes from mixing them.
For an initial residence authorisation, having no criminal record is a requirement, not a factor to be weighed: the applicant must "have no criminal record in Spain or in their previous countries of residence, for offences that exist under Spanish law" (article 31.5 of Organic Act 4/2000).
For a renewal, it is a weighing exercise. The law says the authorities "shall assess, where applicable, criminal records, taking into account any pardons, or situations of conditional remission of the sentence or suspension of a custodial sentence" (article 31.7). That wording matters: a suspended sentence is expressly something the administration must take into account, not something it may ignore.
There is a third provision worth knowing, because it sets the outer limit. A conviction, in Spain or abroad, for an intentional offence punishable here by more than one year of imprisonment is a ground for expulsion, "unless the criminal record has been cancelled" (article 57.2). That last clause is the reason the next section is not administrative housekeeping.
Article 136 of the Criminal Code sets the periods, counted from the day after the sentence is extinguished, provided no further offence is committed: six months for minor penalties; two years for penalties not exceeding twelve months and for those imposed for negligent offences; three years for other less serious penalties under three years; five years for other less serious penalties of three years or more; and ten years for serious penalties.
Cancellation is a right once the period has run, but it is not automatic in practice: it is applied for, and it takes time. Where the sentence was suspended and later remitted, the count is brought forward to the day the sentence would have been served, which can move the date considerably.
The timing is the part worth planning. A record that will be cancellable in eight months, on a permit that expires in three, is a very different problem from the same record with the dates the other way round. That is a calculation to do early, not when the renewal form is in front of you.
The document is the certificado de antecedentes penales. You will be asked for it for residence and nationality applications, for certain jobs, and for some procedures abroad.
Cancellation is what makes the difference here, and it connects back to the expulsion provision above: once the record is cancelled, the ground under article 57.2 no longer applies.
The criminal case is with the court. The residence file is with the Oficina de Extranjería, a different administration on a different timetable.
What that office actually sees is narrower than most people assume, and the distinction is the practical heart of this guide. It sees what is entered in the register of convictions, held within the judicial records system, the SIRAJ. Anything that is not in that register does not exist for it: an open investigation, a summons, a case that was dismissed. A conviction does appear, and a cancelled record does not.
That cuts both ways. A favourable outcome in the criminal case does not update your immigration file on its own, and the immigration file can be decided on an incomplete picture. Both are worth managing rather than hoping for.
I start by establishing which of the two procedures is the urgent one, because it is usually not the one the client is worried about. A renewal deadline can be closer than a trial date, and the order in which they fall changes the strategy entirely.
Then I look at the criminal case with the residence consequence in view: whether an early resolution helps or hurts, what the record will look like when it exists, and when it can be cancelled. Those are questions to answer before deciding how to conduct the defence, not afterwards. Where the immigration side needs its own specialist, I say so and coordinate rather than improvise. You can read how I work, or what I do in criminal defence in Barcelona.
Editorial responsibility: Carles Jiménez, attorney-at-law (Barcelona Bar No. 34.946). This note was prepared with the assistance of artificial-intelligence tools and reviewed and approved by the author before publication.
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