All individuals convicted by a final judgment that have extinguished their criminal responsibility have the right to obtain from the Ministry of Justice the cancellation of their criminal records within the time limits established by law.

The criminal record is constituted by the note of condemnation so that its cancellation affects the set of penalties imposed in a final judgment and not to each of the individualized penalties.

Necessary requirements to cancel that required by Law.

a) To cancel the criminal record (article 136 of the Penal Code):

Not to have committed another offense during the following periods:

· Six months for light sentences.

· Two years for penalties not exceeding twelve months and those imposed for reckless crimes.

· Three years for the remaining less serious penalties of less than three years.

· Five years for the remaining less serious penalties equal or superior to three years.

· Ten years for severe sentences.

The calculation of these deadlines will be interrupted by the commission of new crimes during its course.

b) To cancel the annotations of security measures:

The annotations of the security measures will be canceled once the respective measure has been complied with or prescribed.

Having met the requirements that the law orders, applicants must complete an application in which, necessarily, they will record the following data:

· Name and surnames, affiliation, locality, province and date of birth, document proving their identity and address, mobile phone or e-mail they wish for notification purposes. (On the website of the Ministry of Justice, you will find an application form, but a simple letter from the holder containing all the above mentioned data, as well as a clearly stated request, is sufficient to start the file.

· To speed up the resolution, it is advisable to attach to the application a certificate of compliance with penalties, issued by the competent court or court.

A) Accreditation of the identity of the applicant:

The Criminal Code establishes that the inscriptions of criminal records “will not be public”, reason why the applicant holder of the antecedents whose cancellation is intended must prove its identity with the corresponding documentation in force, which may Through person, by mail or through a duly accredited representative.

This documentation is:

• Spanish or Community holder:
  • D.N.I. In force or a duly authenticated photocopy
  • Community card or passport where applicable, both in force, either through their originals or photocopies of them duly certified.
• Non-EU foreign holder:
  • Residency Card (NIE), or passport where applicable, all of them in force, through their originals or photocopies of them duly certified.

B) Accreditation of representation:

If the interested party acts through a representative, he must also prove his identity, documenting the representation by power of attorney, declaration in personal appearance of the interested party, or any sufficient means in law that leaves a reliable record of such representation.

The performance by means of representative does not exempt the applicant, in any case, from the need to prove their identity in accordance with subparagraph a).

The processing time is three months. At the end of this period, the intended cancellation can be considered estimated even if there has been no express resolution. Notwithstanding the foregoing, the term of resolution shall be suspended when it is necessary to obtain from the judicial body the date of extinction of the criminal responsibility, indispensable for the beginning of the computation of the cancellation periods. (Article 22.1 of Law 39/2015, of October 1, of the Common Administrative Procedure of Public Administrations,

Once the resolution of the file initiated at the request of a party has passed, if the identification of the applicant has been carried out properly, it will be notified by mail to the address designated in the request for that purpose.