Finding out your partner was unfaithful is painful enough on its own. But what if the affair also caused real harm, for example, if you were led to believe a child was biologically yours when it was not? Many people in this situation want to know if they have any legal options.
Spanish courts have not settled on one clear answer for this. There is no single rule that says infidelity itself gives you a right to compensation. But there are court rulings that have awarded damages to a spouse in cases where paternity was concealed.
In one case, the Provincial Court of Barcelona ordered a mother to pay 15,000 euros in compensation, even though the court did not find that she had deliberately deceived her husband. The ruling was based on negligence: she had been intimate with two men around the time of conception and did not take steps to find out who the father was, at a time when paternity tests are simple to get.
In another case, from the Provincial Court of Cantabria in 2016, a father asked for both compensation for emotional harm and repayment of the money he had spent supporting the child. The court only granted the first request: 30,000 euros in compensation, because the mother had hidden from him for 18 years that the child born during their marriage was not his.
What this means for you
These rulings show that Spanish courts can, in some cases, award compensation to a spouse who was deceived about paternity. But it is important to understand that these are isolated decisions, not a general rule applied consistently across the country. Each case depends heavily on its specific facts, so if you believe you are in a similar situation, it is worth getting advice on how the law might apply to you.
