Police assessment of crime victims. A proposal for a protocol drawing from the reform of the Directive 2012/29/UE (COM/2023/424final)

Abstract

One of the fundamental tasks established by the Spanish Law 4/2015 of April 27, on the Statute of the Victim of Crime, for the protection of crime victims is the individual assessment of their needs, which is to be done by criminal justice institutions, and particularly the police forces. This research is based on two main hypotheses: first, that it will be necessary to partially amend Law 4/2015, in order to adapt it to the reform of Directive 2012/29/EU (COM/2023/424 final), which is under discussion at the time of writing; and second, that the individual assessment of victims’ vulnerability, required by both Spanish and European legislation, has become consolidated in practice, given that more than ten years have passed since the entry into force of this obligation. To test these two hypotheses, the study has undertaken, on the one hand, a systematic analysis of the current Spanish regulation, assessing its degree of alignment with the standards proposed at the European level; and, on the other hand, an examination of how victim assessment is handled by police forces. This dual approach has made it possible to identify certain gaps in the regulation, as well as significant implementation dysfunctions. Consequently, the paper concludes with several improvement proposals and presents a draft questionnaire that could be flexibly incorporated into a future police protocol for the individual assessment of victims of crime.