Reporting a Crime in Portugal in 2026: A Practical Guide to Queixa Versus Denúncia, the Six-Month Clock, the Three Classes of Crime, the Free Interpreter, and the Eighteen Offences You Can File Online

Most guides to living in Portugal assume you will never need this one. In practice, foreign residents run into the Portuguese criminal-reporting system fairly often, and usually at the least convenient moment: a bag taken on a train, a rental deposit that turns out to have been a fraud, a neighbour whose behaviour has crossed from irritating into threatening, a landlord who lets himself in.

The system that receives those reports is not complicated, but it is counter-intuitive in two specific ways that catch newcomers out. First, whether the state prosecutes at all can depend on you, and on a deadline you may not know is running. Second, "reporting it to the police" and "filing a queixa" are not always the same act, and the difference decides whether anything happens.

This guide explains the mechanics: the three classes of crime, the six-month clock, where and how to file, what your language rights are, how to attach a claim for money, and how to stop a process you have started. Everything below is drawn from the Código Penal (Penal Code) and the Código de Processo Penal (Code of Criminal Procedure) as currently in force, and from the Ministry of Internal Administration's own electronic complaints system.

The three classes of crime, and why the label decides everything

Portuguese criminal law sorts offences into three procedural categories. The category is fixed by the law that creates the offence, not by how serious the incident felt, and it governs what the state can do without you.

• Crimes públicos (public crimes). The Ministério Público (Public Prosecutor's Office) prosecutes on its own initiative as soon as it learns of the offence. Anyone at all can report it. There is no deadline for you to act, and you cannot call it off. Violência doméstica (domestic violence) under article 152 of the Código Penal is the example that matters most to know: it carries one to five years, and it is public. So is most serious violence, and so is auxílio à imigração ilegal.
• Crimes semipúblicos (semi-public crimes). The prosecution needs a queixa (formal complaint) from the injured party before it can move. Article 49 of the Código de Processo Penal is explicit: those entitled must bring the fact to the knowledge of the Ministério Público so that it may pursue the case. Once you have filed, the state takes over and runs the case. This class covers a large part of ordinary life: furto (theft, article 203), dano (criminal damage, article 212), burla (fraud, article 217), ameaça (threats, article 153) and ofensa à integridade física simples (simple assault, article 143).
• Crimes particulares (private crimes). The heaviest burden. Under article 50, you must file a queixa, constitute yourself as assistente (a formal party to the proceedings, which requires a lawyer), and then bring the accusation yourself. The Ministério Público investigates alongside you and accuses jointly, but it will not carry the case alone. Difamação (defamation) and injúria (insult) fall here, under article 188, with narrow exceptions where the victim exercises public authority.

The boundaries move in ways worth knowing. Simple assault is normally semi-public, but under article 143(3) it becomes public when the victim is a police officer, a prison guard, a teacher or other education professional, a health professional, a tax inspector, or a transport ticket inspector, acting in or because of their duties. Theft is semi-public, but article 207 pushes it down into the private class when the thief is your spouse, an ascendant, a descendant, a relative to the second degree or someone you live with as a couple, and also for shoplifting of low-value goods immediately recovered.

Queixa and denúncia are different words for different things

English collapses both into "report". Portuguese law does not.

A denúncia is the act of telling the authorities that a crime has occurred. Anyone can make one. Article 246 of the Código de Processo Penal says it may be made verbally or in writing and is subject to no special formalities; a verbal report is written down and signed by the officer and by you.

A queixa is the legal expression of will by the injured party that the offender be prosecuted. It is the key that unlocks a semi-public or private case. Under article 113 of the Código Penal, the right belongs to the ofendido, the holder of the interest the criminal provision was designed to protect.

The practical consequence is set out in article 242(3): where a crime depends on a queixa, a denúncia only leads to an inquérito being opened if the queixa is filed within the legal time limit. You can describe the theft to an officer in perfect detail and still have nothing happen, because describing is not complaining.

When you file, say clearly that you wish to file a queixa and that you want criminal proceedings against the person responsible, and check that the statement you sign says so. Article 49(3) allows the queixa to be filed by you, by a lawyer, or by a representative holding specific powers for the purpose, which is useful if you are abroad when you discover the offence.

The six-month clock

This is the single most consequential rule in the guide, and the one people most often learn about too late.

Article 115 of the Código Penal: the right of complaint extinguishes six months after the date on which the holder became aware of the fact and of its authors. Not six months from the offence. Six months from when you knew both what happened and who did it, which can be later, and occasionally much later, than the event.

Three refinements matter:

• The single statutory exception is for the sexual offences listed in article 178(1), where the period is one year rather than six months.
• Where there are several people entitled to complain, article 115(4) runs the clock separately for each of them. One person's silence does not necessarily bury the case.
• Failing to complain in time as against one participant in the crime benefits the others, in cases where they too cannot be pursued without a complaint.

If you are anywhere near the six-month mark, file first and organise the evidence afterwards. A queixa does not have to be complete to be valid, and article 246 imposes no special formalities. What it has to be is on time.

Where to file

You have four routes, and they are not equivalent.

A PSP esquadra or a GNR posto. The default. The Polícia de Segurança Pública covers cities and larger towns; the Guarda Nacional Republicana covers the rest of the country. Either will take the report and forward it. Article 49(2) is a useful safeguard here: a complaint addressed to any entity under a legal duty to transmit it to the Public Prosecutor counts as having been made to the Public Prosecutor. Filing at the wrong station does not lose you the date.

Directly to the Ministério Público. You can go to the local Departamento de Investigação e Ação Penal or the prosecution service at the local court and file there. This is the sensible route for anything documentary and complex: a fraud with a paper trail, a workplace matter, an offence where you already have a lawyer.

The Queixa Eletrónica portal. The Ministry of Internal Administration runs an online system at queixaselectronicas.mai.gov.pt for filing with the GNR or the PSP electronically. The list of eligible offences is set by Portaria n.º 1593/2007, of 17 December, and currently runs to eighteen types: simple assault, domestic violence, ill-treatment, human trafficking, procuring, theft, robbery, criminal damage, fraud, employment-related fraud, extortion, damage to or removal of documents and technical records, damage against nature, use of another person's identity or travel document, pollution, aiding illegal immigration, illegal labour recruitment, and marriage of convenience.

The portal is explicitly open to foreigners: complaints may be filed by identified natural persons, national or foreign, resident in Portugal or present on national territory. Authentication is by Cartão de Cidadão, Chave Móvel Digital, Via CTT or in-person identification, and there is a separate area for checking the status of a complaint you have already filed. Once identity is validated, the site states, the complaint is treated exactly as one filed in person at a police station.

What it is not for is stated equally plainly: the system does not serve emergencies or situations requiring an immediate response from the security forces, and in particular not a crime in progress. For those, 112 is the national and European emergency number, 117 the fire-alert line, and 144 the national social-emergency line.

Through a victim-support office. APAV, the Portuguese Association for Victim Support, runs the Linha de Apoio à Vítima on 116 006, free, weekdays from 08:00 to 23:00, plus a chatbot available at any hour and a national network of Gabinetes de Apoio à Vítima. Its support is free, confidential and specialist, and it includes legal guidance on whether and how to file. Of the 18,549 victims APAV supported directly in 2025, 57 percent went on to formalise a report to the judicial authorities. The gap in that figure is the reason services like this exist: among older victims in particular, under-reporting is the norm rather than the exception.

Your language rights

These are stronger than most foreign residents assume, and they are worth invoking rather than muddling through.

Article 92 of the Código de Processo Penal makes Portuguese the language of proceedings, and then provides that where a person takes part who does not know or does not have command of Portuguese, a competent interpreter is appointed at no cost to that person. The right does not depend on the officer conducting the act happening to speak your language.

Article 246(5) goes further at the reporting stage: where the person making the report does not know or command Portuguese, the report is to be made in a language they understand. If you are told to come back with a friend who speaks Portuguese, that is not what the code says.

What happens next

If the officer witnessed the offence, or it is one of the crimes police must report, they draw up an auto de notícia under article 243, recording the facts, the day, hour, place and circumstances, and everything ascertainable about the identity of those involved and the known evidence, including witnesses. That document must reach the Public Prosecutor within a maximum of ten days, and it counts as a denúncia in its own right.

The Public Prosecutor then opens an inquérito, the investigation phase. Under article 247, the prosecutor is required to inform you about the complaint regime and its procedural consequences, about the legal-aid scheme, about compensation for victims of violent crime under Lei n.º 104/2009 and the advance payments available to domestic-violence victims, and about the existence of public and private victim-support bodies. In practice that information arrives as a form letter, and it is worth actually reading.

Article 67-A of the code defines "vítima" and, separately, "vítima especialmente vulnerável" (especially vulnerable victim), a status that turns on age, health, disability, or on the type, degree and duration of the victimisation. The label carries real procedural protections, and it is granted by the authorities rather than requested, so raising the relevant circumstances early matters.

Becoming an assistente

An assistente is a formal party to the criminal case, able to see the file, request investigative steps, accuse alongside the prosecutor and appeal independently. It requires a lawyer and it carries court fees.

Article 68 lets ofendidos over 16 constitute themselves as assistentes, along with those on whose complaint the case depends. Where the deceased is the victim, the surviving spouse or partner, descendants, ascendants and, failing them, siblings can step in. The deadlines are the trap: for a private crime, the request must come within ten days of the police warning under article 246(4); otherwise, you can join at any point up to five days before the start of the trial hearing or the instruction debate, or within the period for appealing the sentence.

For a semi-public crime, becoming an assistente is optional. For a private crime it is compulsory, and skipping it ends the case.

Getting money back

Portugal uses the princípio de adesão. Article 71 requires that a civil claim founded on a crime be brought inside the criminal case, and only separately in the civil courts in the situations the law lists. That is efficient: one process, one set of facts, no second action.

The mechanics are in articles 75 and 77. Once the authorities become aware there is an injured party, they must inform you that you may bring a civil claim and how; you may state your intention to do so at any point up to the close of the inquérito. The claim itself is then filed in an articulated pleading within 20 days of being notified of the accusation, or within 20 days of the accused being notified if you were not. Where the amount is small enough that a lawyer would not be required in a separate civil action, article 77(4) lets you simply ask the court to fix compensation, with no special formalities.

Two further routes exist. Under article 82-A, where no civil claim has been brought at all, the court may on conviction award a sum as reparation where the victim's particular protection needs require it. And separately from the criminal case, the Comissão de Proteção às Vítimas de Crimes, an independent administrative body attached to the Ministry of Justice, grants state advances on compensation to victims of violent crime and of domestic violence.

If the cost of a lawyer is the obstacle, that is a solved problem in Portuguese law rather than a reason not to proceed. See our guide to apoio judiciário, the means-tested legal aid scheme run through Segurança Social.

Anonymous reports

You can report anonymously, but article 246 limits what it achieves. An anonymous report only triggers an inquérito if indicia of a crime can be drawn from it, or if the report itself constitutes a crime. Where it does lead to an investigation, the authorities inform the person holding the right of complaint that the report exists. Where it does not, the judicial authority arranges for it to be destroyed.

The practical reading: anonymity is available, and for a crime público it can be enough to start something. For anything that needs a queixa, it is not, because a queixa requires an identified holder of the right.

Withdrawing

You can stop a case you have started, within limits set by article 116 of the Código Penal.

Renúncia is giving up the right before exercising it, expressly or by conduct from which it necessarily follows. Desistência is withdrawing a complaint already filed. It is permitted up to the publication of the first-instance judgment, but only where the accused does not oppose it, and once you withdraw, the complaint cannot be renewed. Article 51 of the procedural code then ends the prosecutor's involvement upon homologation of the withdrawal.

Note what this does not cover. A crime público cannot be withdrawn, because it never depended on your complaint. Domestic violence is the case where this most often surprises people: once the state knows, the state proceeds, whatever the parties later decide between themselves. That design is deliberate, and it sits behind the scale of the national response, from the network of casas-abrigo (shelters) to the specialised police units.

What This Means for Foreign Residents

• Say the word "queixa", and check the paper. Filing a report and expressing the will to prosecute are legally distinct. Ask for a copy or a reference number for what you signed. It is the only proof that the clock stopped.
• Diarise the six-month date the day the offence happens. Six months from knowledge of the fact and its author, one year for the sexual offences under article 178(1). Everything else can be sorted out later; the deadline cannot.
• Use the online portal for the ordinary offences and nothing else. Eighteen crime types, authentication with Cartão de Cidadão or Chave Móvel Digital, and no use whatsoever for anything in progress. For that, 112.
• Demand the interpreter. Article 92 gives you one at no cost, and article 246(5) says the report should be taken in a language you understand. A statement you did not fully understand is a poor foundation for a case that may run for years.
• Attach the money claim inside the criminal case. The princípio de adesão means you should not be running a parallel civil action. Say you intend to claim before the inquérito closes, and file within the 20-day window afterwards.
• For a private crime, budget for a lawyer immediately. Defamation and insult require you to constitute yourself as assistente within ten days of the police warning and then accuse. Miss that and the case is over regardless of the merits.
• Get free advice before you decide. APAV's Linha de Apoio à Vítima, 116 006, is free on weekdays from 08:00 to 23:00 and will talk you through the classification and the deadline without any obligation to proceed.
• Not every dispute belongs in the criminal system. An unpaid invoice, a builder who did poor work, a deposit withheld without a fraudulent scheme behind it: these are civil matters, and Portugal has a cheaper venue for them. See our guide to the julgados de paz, the small-claims peace courts.

The Portuguese system is, on paper, generous to victims: free interpreters, a compensation claim folded into the criminal case, state advances where the offender cannot pay, and an online filing route open to any foreigner present in the country. What it is not is self-starting for the offences most people actually experience. Theft, damage, fraud, threats and simple assault all wait on you to say, in the right place and inside six months, that you want the state to act.