DR1 Daily News - Dominican Republic

With his signature on Sunday, 3 August 2025, President Luis Abinader enacted the Penal Code. The new Penal Code will go into effect in a year’s time, giving still many months for consultations and possible future amendments by Congress.

The ruling party majority Modern Revolutionary Party senate and chamber of deputies had delivered the bill to the President after a marathonic session that ended at 3am on Friday, 5 August 2025. It was the best they could do after years of expensive outings to resorts for debates and long discussions in the Centro de los Heroes headquarters, and millions spent on advisors. Regardless, the bill has been criticized as a setback instead of the modern penal code the country wanted.

Generalized dissatisfaction with what the PRM-majority Congress had delivered as its version for a modernized Penal Code had many asking President Luis Abinader to...