Enforcement of fines
Enforcement of fines
"I've heard about fines under the new criminal law; how are they applied?
Maurice, Onex
The new Penal Code, which came into force on 1 January 2007, more specifically Article 34, provides for the application of fines for short sentences. Under this provision, the judge imposes a financial penalty in the form of a day's fine. In practice, this means that the convicted person will not go to prison but will have to pay a fine. The number of day fines is set according to the nature of the offence. In addition, the judge will have to determine the proportion of this day-fine, i.e. the value of the day-fine according to the offender's personal situation, in particular his income and assets. The value of the day's fine is a maximum of CHF 3,000 and, in Geneva, a minimum of CHF 30. Unless otherwise provided by law, the fine may not exceed 360 days.
If the convicted person does not pay the fine and the fine cannot be enforced by debt collection, the fine is replaced by a custodial sentence.
One day's fine will correspond to one day's custodial sentence. In lieu of a custodial sentence of less than 6 months or a monetary penalty of up to 180 day fines, the judge may, with the offender's consent, order community service of up to 720 hours.
It should also be noted that the judge may grant a suspended sentence; this suspends the execution of the pecuniary penalty or community service, or even a custodial sentence of at least 6 months and at most 2 years when a firm sentence does not seem necessary to raise the awareness of the offender, who can then be expected to behave irreproachably in the future. We must not lose sight of the fact that the prison system is expensive for the taxpayer and that for minor offences, it sometimes poses insoluble social problems. However, in addition to the suspended sentence, the judge may also impose an unsuspended fine or a firm fine. In this case, the fine is suspended, but the offender must still pay an additional fine.
