Annual Report 2012: Spain’s National Preventive Mechanism During the visit to the Spanish National Police Force station of the Usera-Vil­ laverde district in Madrid, it came to light that, after the recording of statements, lawyers and detainees held interviews in the area at the entrance of the prison cells, without minimum privacy, since the police officers were located nearby in order to visually control detainees, as the latter themselves declared. Given the fact that at such facilities there are two rooms for the recording of statements, with a small glass window in the door which would allow for visual control, a Suggestion has been sent to the Directorate General of the Police for those rooms to be used for interviews between detainees and their lawyers. Due to the complexity of the crime, there have been detentions where the 72­ hour- period has been used up or even exceeded The Spanish Constitutional Court considers that the practice of taking detainees before a judicial authority in the early morning the day after completing the police action prolongs unnecessarily the detention, thus infringing Art. 17.2 of the Spanish Constitution Detainees get health assistance when they request it 42 21. During the visits carried out in 2012 the Institution requested information and, while examining the Report of Custody and Registration of Detainees, were able to verify that the majority of said detainees were handed over to the judicial authorities within a maximum period of 24 hours. It is however true that there have been cases in which, due to the complexity of the crime under investigation, the detention has exceeded such time frame, nearly using up the 72 hours, and even more, at times, although always with the appropriate authorization from the courts. This latter scenario was detected at the Civil Guard post in the Algeciras Port (Cadiz), where the judicial authority was requested to authorize the deten­ tion for an additional period of 72 hours, so that detainees carrying drugs inside their bodies may expel them. As regards the handing over of detainees to the judicial authorities, it should be recalled that it is reiterated case law of the Spanish Constitutional Court that in­ fringement of Article 17.2 of the Spanish Constitution may take place not only on exceeding the maximum absolute period of 72 hours accorded from the time of the detention, but also when -within this maximum period- the temporary limit regarding detention is exceeded, since it is no longer necessary due to the fact that the investigation to clarify the occurrences had been carried out, and the de­ tainee is however not released or taken before a judicial authority. In this sense, said high court of justice has considered that the practice of taking detainees before the judicial authorities in the early morning the day following the police action, thus unnecessarily prolonging the duration of the detention, infringes the aforementioned article. This does not imply that the existence of collaboration protocols between the courts and the State Security Forces, which try to regulate the transfer of detainees, is incompatible with the constitutional requirement of not unduly prolonging the detention time of a citizen, since both provisions may coexist reasonably, and the particular circumstances involved shall be pondered in each case. 22. At the interviews held with detainees, all of them declared that, when they requested the assistance of a physician, they were taken to a health center or the health services were called to the facilities, thus complying with this right estab­ lished in Article 520 of the Spanish Code of Criminal Procedure (abbreviated as LEcrim in Spanish). On the other hand, during the visits to the Superior Police THE OMBUDSMAN OF SPAIN