Swiss Criminal Code

¹ There is no stat­ute of lim­it­a­tions for the of­fences of:

a.

gen­o­cide (Art. 264);

b.

crimes against hu­man­ity (Art. 264a para. 1 and 2);

c.

war crimes (Art. 264c para. 1–3, 264d para. 1 and 2, 264e para. 1 and 2, 264f, 264g para. 1 and 2 and 264h);

d.

felon­ies that have caused or threatened to cause danger to life and limb to a large num­ber of per­sons as a meth­od of ex­tor­tion or duress, in par­tic­u­lar through the use of means of mass de­struc­tion, the caus­ing of cata­strophes, or as part of a host­age tak­ing of­fence;

e.¹⁴²

sexu­al acts with chil­dren (Art. 187 Nos 1 and 1^bis), sexu­al ab­use and in­de­cent as­sault (Art. 189), rape (Art. 190), sexu­al acts with per­sons in­cap­able of prop­er judge­ment or res­ist­ance (Art. 191), ex­ploit­a­tion of a per­son in a po­s­i­tion of need or de­pend­ency (Art. 193) and de­cep­tion as to the sexu­al char­ac­ter of an act (Art. 193a) if com­mit­ted against chil­dren un­der the age of 12.¹⁴³

² If the right to pro­sec­ute the of­fence would have be­come time barred had Art­icles 97 and 98 ap­plied, the court may in its dis­cre­tion im­pose a more le­ni­ent pen­alty.

³ Para­graphs 1 let­ters a, c and d and para­graph 2 ap­ply if the right to pro­sec­ute or ex­ecute the sen­tence had not be­come time barred by 1 Janu­ary 1983 in ac­cord­ance with the law ap­plic­able un­til that point in time. Para­graph 1let­ter b ap­plies if the right to pro­sec­ute or ex­ecute the pen­alty has not be­come time barred un­der the pre­vi­ous law when the Amend­ment of 18 June 2010 to this Code comes in­to force. Para­graph 1 let­ter e ap­plies if the pro­sec­u­tion or the sen­tence has not be­come time barred by 30 Novem­ber 2008 in ac­cord­ance with the law ap­plic­able un­til that point in time.^{144 145}