Low-level Punishment in Switzerland
In Lăcătuş v. Switzerland, decided in January 2021, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) reviewed a Geneva law criminalizing people for begging. The case was brought before the Court by a Roma person found guilty of begging and fined 500 Swiss francs (about 460 euro). Under the terms of their sentence, because they could not afford the fine, they served a prison sentence. The ECHR held the Geneva law to violate a person’s right to dignity because the person was criminalized and harshly punished for turning to what may be their only means of survival.
While this law was found to be disproportionate, many similar laws criminalizing begging or other crimes of poverty are prosecuted by Swiss authorities every year. Many are imprisoned for being unable to afford fines. In other words, the law and practices in question in the Lăcătuş case are part of a larger pattern of punishment in Switzerland.
In this briefing, we look at low-level punishment: the types of offenses punished, the consequences of low-level punishment for people, procedural deficiencies, and racial disparities. Among a number of problems, we find that Switzerland aggressively criminalizes people experiencing poverty, migrants, and other people from racialized groups.