Article 29 Federal Criminal Code

The pecuniary sanction comprises the fine and the reparation of damage.

The fine consists of the payment of an amount of money to the State, which shall be fixed by fine days, which may not exceed one thousand, except in the cases that the law itself indicates. The fine day is equivalent to the net daily income of the sentenced person at the moment of consummating the crime, taking into account all his income.

For the effects of this Code, the lower limit of the fine day shall be the equivalent to the daily minimum wage in force in the place where the crime was consummated. As regards the continuing crime, the minimum wage in force at the moment of consummation of the last conduct shall be considered. For the permanent one, the minimum wage in force at the moment in which the consummation ceased shall be considered.

When it is accredited that the sentenced person cannot pay the fine or can only cover part of it, the judicial authority may substitute it, totally or partially, by the rendering of work in favor of the community.

Each working day shall settle one fine day. When the substitution of the fine by the rendering of services is not possible or convenient, the judicial authority may place the sentenced person at liberty under surveillance, which shall not exceed the number of fine days substituted.

If the sentenced person refuses without justified cause to cover the amount of the fine, the State shall demand it by means of the coercive economic procedure.

At any time the amount of the fine may be covered, deducting from it the part proportional to the working days rendered in favor of the community, or to the time of imprisonment that the sentenced person has served in the case of the fine substituting the penalty depriving of liberty, in which case the equivalence shall be at the rate of one fine day per one day of imprisonment.