In brief: The Coimbra Court of Appeal refused a prosecution request to the three operators for every card and handset that activated particular masts within a four-hour window. It accepted that the provision relied on permits access to stored traffic data, but dismissed the appeal because a prior requirement was missing: there was no identified suspect. Interference with communications must be directed at concrete persons, not used to discover them.
The case
Two aggravated thefts causing losses of more than 500,000 euros were under investigation. The perpetrators appeared on the surveillance footage with their faces covered, which ruled out identification by that route. The prosecution then asked the three operators for all SIM cards and equipment numbers that had activated particular masts within a four-hour window, with the stated aim of narrowing the universe from there until reaching the perpetrators.
What the court conceded to the prosecution
This is worth recording, because the decision is not one of principle against investigation. The court accepted that article 189(2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure is not confined to real-time interception and that it survived Constitutional Court judgment 268/2022, which struck down provisions of the data retention law. The prosecution’s underlying legal thesis was therefore accepted.
Where the request failed
It failed on a prior and indispensable requirement: the existence of an identified or sufficiently individualised suspect. What was sought was to build, from an indeterminate universe of users, a set of potential suspects. The court characterised the exercise as identificatory and prospective rather than evidential, and held that interference with communications must be directed at determinate persons and can never be mass or undifferentiated.
Why this matters to people never suspected of anything
On such a request, everyone who passed those masts in those four hours would come to appear on a list held by the investigation, without the slightest indication against any of them. In an urban area that may be thousands of people. What the decision establishes is that the intrusion cannot be offset by investigative usefulness: the line is drawn earlier, in the requirement of an individualised target.
For anyone who comes to be accused
There is a line of defence here to check whenever a charge rests on cell-site location. The question is how the investigation reached the accused: whether through indications that already pointed to him, with traffic data serving to confirm, or whether he emerged from a mast sweep. In the second case, what is in issue is the validity of the step that generated all the subsequent evidence, with the consequences proper to prohibitions on evidence.
What to do in practice
Anyone accused in proceedings involving cell-site evidence should request the order authorising access to the data, check how the request was framed, whether it identified a determinate person or merely a time window and a set of masts, and at what stage of the investigation it was made — a request predating the individualisation of any suspect is by definition prospective. From the investigation’s side the reading is equally practical: the request must identify the person or persons targeted and why they are already suspected, failing which the step is lost, and with it whatever derives from it. Coimbra Court of Appeal, case 121/26.0GBCNT-A.C1, 09-07-2026, reporting judge Paula Cristina de Carvalho e Sá.
The full newsletter
This note forms part of the edition of 18 September 2026 of the firm’s biweekly newsletter, with thirty-two items in Portuguese and English. The full document, on letterhead, is available here.
This note is provided for information purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Concrete solutions depend on the facts of each case and on the regime applicable at the time. For specific questions, please consult a lawyer.