In Ibiza, the line between a planning file and a criminal case is crossed more often than people think: the environmental and planning prosecutors are active on the island, and works on protected rustic land can end up not before the Consell but before an investigating court. Two things are worth knowing from the start: the Criminal Code’s penalties for offences against land planning are serious — prison, fines, disqualification and demolition — and not every illegal build is a crime. The word separating the two worlds is “non-authorisable”.
What article 319 punishes
The offence has two tiers. The aggravated tier punishes urbanisation, construction or building works that could not be authorised on specially protected land — road reserves, green zones, public domain and places of recognised landscape, ecological, artistic, historic or cultural value — with prison from one and a half to four years, a fine of twelve to twenty-four months or proportional to the profit, and professional disqualification. The basic tier punishes non-authorisable works on non-developable land with prison from one to three years and analogous associated penalties. On an island where protected rustic land abounds, a good share of cases enters directly through the aggravated tier.
Who can be liable
The offence targets developers, builders and supervising technicians. Case law has settled the question that matters most to private individuals: a “developer” includes the owner who commissions works for himself, with no need to be a professional. The builder who executes knowing what he executes and the architect or surveyor who supervises are equally liable, and legal entities have their own penalty regime. Whoever buys the house later does not commit the offence, but can suffer its consequences: demolition does not distinguish between owners.
The key to every defence: “non-authorisable”
The Code does not punish building without a licence: it punishes building what could not be authorised. If the works complied with the planning rules and only the permit was missing — a legalisable administrative infringement — there is no crime, however serious the file. That is why the heart of these proceedings is expert and planning-based before it is criminal: the land’s real classification, the applicable parameters, legalisability at the time of the facts. And that is also why the criminal route must not be used as a shortcut for administrative enforcement: sending merely legalisable irregularities to a criminal court denatures the offence.
Demolition under 319.3 and confiscation
Judges may order, at the offender’s expense, the demolition of the works and the restoration of the land, plus confiscation of the gains. The Supreme Court treats demolition as the general rule, absent proven disproportion, and the criminal conviction coexists with the administrative restoration file: two routes to the same demolition. Voluntary restoration before trial, by contrast, weighs in favour on both sentence and civil liability.
Article 320: when the problem is the licence
Planning prevarication punishes the authority or official who knowingly reports favourably on, or votes for, projects contrary to planning rules. It matters to private parties more than it seems: some cases are born from licences granted and later challenged, and the position of a good-faith holder who built under cover of an administrative act is radically different from that of someone who built with nothing. Documenting that good faith is defence in advance.
Two routes, two clocks
These offences are time-barred after five years; the administrative restoration action on rustic land, since 2018, never expires. The combination produces surprising results: a time-barred crime does not prevent an administrative demolition order decades later, and an administrative infringement time-barred under the previous regime may never have been a crime at all. Every case requires mapping both clocks at once, and watching the double-jeopardy rule where administrative penalty and criminal sentence converge on the same facts.
If the summons arrives
Cases usually start with a complaint from the administration, a Seprona (environmental police) report or testimony carved out of a planning file. The golden rules do not change: do not testify without preparing the defence, obtain the complete planning file before the police report, and move early the pieces that time makes expensive — a legalisability expert report, legalisation where possible, voluntary restoration where advisable. In these offences, the best judgment is built in the first three months.
Frequently asked questions
Can you go to prison over a pool or an extension?
Basic-tier sentences allow suspension for first offenders, but a conviction comes with a fine, possible demolition and a criminal record. The real risk is not just the cell: it is the whole package.
If the crime is time-barred, am I safe from demolition?
Not necessarily: the administrative route has its own time limits and on rustic land it never expires. They are independent clocks.
Are the architect and the builder liable too?
Yes, as supervising technicians and builders, if they knew the situation. Each participant’s defence is different and sometimes opposed.
Can I buy a house with a criminal case under way?
You can; an eventual demolition will affect the property whoever buys it. It is a risk to be analysed, priced and discounted — never ignored.