Police intelligence and its triple legal dimension: preventive activity, means of investigation and expert evidence for the prosecution

Abstract

Police intelligence is a powerful tool for the prevention, investigation and prosecution of serious crime such as organized crime and terrorism. This is recognized by the international community, led by the USA and the EU, which since the beginning of this century has been promoting a criminal policy model based on the collection, storage and analysis of information as a fundamental pillar for the early detection of security threats. However, despite its obvious practical importance, police intelligence work is difficult to categorize from a criminal law perspective. Spanish procedural legislation does not expressly provide for its validity as an element of conviction at the time of sentencing, nor does it contemplate specific ways for its use in the framework of criminal cases. Only case law has given procedural recognition to this type of analysis, incorporating it into the act of the oral trial and, therefore, into the body of evidence, as expert evidence. However, the jurisprudential construction of the so-called intelligence expert evidence, in addition to presenting an atypical character with respect to the classic conception of this means of evidence, leaves out the relevant effects that this police activity has in stages prior to the prosecution of the crimes. Therefore, in order to evaluate the true place of police intelligence in the criminal justice system, it is necessary to locate its origin and functions within the field of prevention, as an extra or pre-procedural action, and not only as prosecution evidence.