Putting People in Danger (COVID-19)

We currently live in a pandemic situation caused by the virus known as Coronavirus 2019 (COVID-19).

Being an epidemic that has occurred and occurs on a scale that has crossed and crosses international borders, affecting people on a global scale.

On March 20, 2020, the first case was confirmed in Cape Verde, in a 62-year-old man who had traveled from the UK.

Since then Cape Verde has been implementing a series of measures aimed at reducing social contact.

Knowing that this is a highly contagious disease, and even with the implementation of various measures by the Government of Cape Verde, there are people who persist in not complying, putting their own lives and that of others at risk.

Cape Verde’s Penal Code has provisions to punish people who put the lives of others at risk.

Cape Verde’s Penal Code provides for a specific chapter, with the epigraph “placing people in danger”, the legislator wanting to protect situations that put people at risk.

The danger of contagion from serious illness is typified in the Penal Code of Cape Verde, as a crime in its article 156, with the following wording:

“Whoever commits, in order to transmit to another person a serious disease that he suffers from, is affected or contaminated, an act capable of producing the infection or contagion, will be punished with imprisonment from 2 to 6 years, if he does not have a more serious penalty. fit under another legal provision.”

Furthermore, still in the Penal Code of Cape Verde, we find another chapter with the epigraph “crimes against collective security”.

Article 299 of the Penal Code of Cape Verde provides that “Anyone who spreads a contagious disease, creating danger to life or serious danger to the physical integrity of others, will be punished with imprisonment from 1 to 6 years.”

If danger is created, the penalty will be 6 months to 4 years in prison or a fine of 100 to 300 days. However, if the conduct is carried out due to negligence, the penalty will be up to 3 years of imprisonment or a fine of 80 to 200 days.

The legal text uses the vocabulary to propagate, as it is a dangerous crime, it is not necessary to directly contagion from anyone for the facts to be subsumable to the provisions of the aforementioned article.

It is important to note that the crime of danger of contagion of serious illness is consummated at the times when the agent performs the act capable of producing the contagion, regardless of the effective transmission.

The crimes mentioned above are public crimes, that is, the criminal procedure does not depend on the victim’s complaint. In the case of public crimes, anyone can report such acts.

This is a dangerous situation arising not from an objectively criminal fact, but from the very nature of the disease which, due to its recognized seriousness and being highly contagious, justifies, by itself, the application of measures to protect society (and also of the patient himself).

Lets protect ourselves and denounce those who endanger your life and that of others.