Electronic Processing of Criminal Cases

Articles 17/01/2025

The Portuguese justice system, like that of many other countries, has faced challenges over the years related to bureaucracy, slow processes and the excessive use of physical media (paper). Despite several attempts at reform and modernization, the procedural system faced problems related to document and archive management, difficulty in access and communication between the parties, and the lack of true integration between the different entities involved in legal proceedings. In this context, the digitalization of justice has been one of the major goals of the government and the judiciary in Portugal.

Therefore, Executive Order No. 266/2024/1 appears as an important step towards overcoming these deficiencies, mainly by expanding the use of electronic processing, allowing Representatives to consult the processes and monitor the progress of the processes more quickly and efficiently, allowing them to respond more quickly to queries raised by clients regarding the status of the process.

Order No. 266/2024/1, of 15 October, therefore marks a significant step forward in the digitalisation of the Portuguese justice system, especially with regard to the processes and procedures of the Public Prosecutor’s Office. It establishes the expansion of the rules for electronic processing to the processes that run within the scope of this service, a crucial step in the modernisation and digital access to judicial processes, since the lack of immediate access to information was one of the main obstacles to the speed of proceedings and transparency of the justice system.

Until the publication of the Order, Representatives who wished to consult a case had to send a request, by email or post, to the competent Department of Investigation and Criminal Prosecution, addressed to the Public Prosecutor’s Office Magistrate, requesting consultation of the case. The granting order could take weeks or even months (depending on the workload of the Public Prosecutor’s Office and the complexity of the case), and, if granted, would require the Representative to travel to the court to carry out the consultation, otherwise, in many cases, this would involve long journeys.

Thus, the computerization of proceedings brings several benefits, namely in terms of procedural speed, by allowing the parties involved in the proceedings to follow their progress in real time and by reducing the need for physical trips to the court, but also benefits related to environmental sustainability, since the dematerialization of proceedings will mean the reduction/elimination of paper and physical documents, with a positive environmental impact.

Although the Ordinance represents a considerable advance, it still imposes some limitations, mainly with regard to the dependence on the order of the Public Prosecutor’s Office for full access to the proceedings, since the consultation of the proceedings continues to depend on a prior order of approval by the competent Magistrate, which means that access to the proceedings is not immediate.


The content of this information does not constitute any specific legal advice; the latter can only be given when faced with a specific case. Please contact us for any further clarification or information deemed necessary in what concerns the application of the law.

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  • Tax Litigation

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