36. The Criminal Code of the National Civil Police regulated offenses against police integrity in articles 197 and 198, and misappropriation of funds in article 222,26 as follows: Article 197. Anyone who falsifies documents relating to the service, such as [financial] statements, vouchers, communications, reports, correspondence, interventions, wording relating to retirement, incapacity, or pensions, ledgers, records, promotions, demotions, passports, or any other document relating to the administration or exercise of the Institution’s functions or posts shall be punished with six to nine years of medium-term ordinary imprisonment. Falsification may consist in imitation, elimination, increase, insertion or alteration of letters, signatures or headings, or the numbering of the text of any document; in forging the complete document, or in adding or eliminating persons, clauses, obligations, excuses, conventions, statements, acts or agreements, in the number, quantity or quality, in the dates or days, or in the imitation or falsification or undue use of seals, stamps, marks, bodkins, plates or clichés. If the falsification is committed in relation to significant documents and causes very serious prejudices to the State, the Institution or individuals, the punishment shall be eight to twelve years of long-term ordinary imprisonment. If the falsification is perpetrated in relation to matters of little value or significant, the punishment shall be two to five years’ imprisonment. Article 198. Anyone who knowingly makes use of a false document shall be punished with the same sanctions. Article 222. Anyone who, in order to favor other persons or for their own use, perpetrates any of the following acts shall be punished with three to six years of medium-term ordinary imprisonment: […] 3. Anyone who, in buying, selling or leasing real estate or assets of the Institution, or for the Institution obtains any personal benefit or benefit for third parties; 4. Anyone who, in any contract corresponding to the Institution alters the original price, weight, quantity or quality; […] 10. Anyone who signs contracts on behalf of the Institution, dispensing with tendering procedures, when the law requires this […]. 37. In 2003, the Code of Criminal Procedure (hereinafter also “the CCP”) was amended by the Law amending the Code of Criminal Procedure, Law 2003-101; its article 10 amended article 160 of the common CCP,27 so that the wording would read: Art. 160. Types. Individual precautionary measures are detention, pre-trial detention, and detención en firme. Substantive precautionary measures are: prohibition to dispose of assets, sequester, confiscation and embargo. Detención en firme shall be ordered in all cases in which an order to initiate a trial is issued, pursuant to article 232 of this Code and may only be revoked by an acquittal and suspended in offenses punished by imprisonment. 38. In addition, article 16 of the Law amending the common Code of Criminal Procedure, Law 2003-101, introduced the legal measure of detención en firme. The common CCP established detención en firme in its article 173-A,28 which stipulated that: To ensure the presence of the accused at the trial stage and to avoid the suspension of the proceedings, in the order to initiate a trial, the judge who is hearing the case shall, imperatively, order the detención en firme of the accused, except in the following cases: 1. Of the person who has been classified as presumed accessory after the fact, and 2. Of those being tried for an offense for which the punishment is less that one year’s imprisonment. If an order of pre-trial detention has been issued for the accused, when issuing the order to initiate a trial, this shall be changed to detención en firme. 26 Criminal Code of the National Civil Police, articles 197, 198 and 222, paras. 3, 4 and 10, supra. Law amending the Code of Criminal Procedure, Law 2003-101, article 10 of which amended article 160 of the CCP https://www.derechoecuador.com/registro-oficial/2003/01/registro-oficial-13-de-enero-del-2003#anchor480794 Consulted on September 23, 2021. 27 28 Law amending the Code of Criminal Procedure, Law 2003-101, article 16, which added article 173–A, supra. 11