When Parot arrived to Strasbourg

Abstract

In February 2006, the Spanish Supreme Court modified its case-law regarding some provisions of the abrogated Criminal Code of 1973 that allowed the early release of prisoners if they worked while serving their sentence and they demonstrated good conduct. This change in the Spanish Supreme Court case-law had relevant consequences for some convicted prisoners as it meant an important extension of imprisonment years. Many of the prisoners affected by this new case-law appealed against the decisions extending their time in prison before the Spanish Constitutional Court and, after that, before the European Court of Human Rights. In this context, the main aim of this paper is to analyse the decisions adopted by these Courts while reviewing the Spanish Supreme Court case law, and to determine what the Spanish authorities must do after the European Court decision in «Del Río Prada», the sole case in which the European Court has examined the Spanish Supreme Court case-law.