On the night of 13 July 2025, officers stopped a woman walking with two friends on Rambla Prim in Barcelona. On 5 November 2026, Barcelona City Council suspended one of the officers for 24 days without pay after he repeatedly refused to address her in Catalan. Municipal sources said the disciplinary case covered both the refusal and what the city described as inappropriate treatment.
The intervention was recorded. In footage released by Plataforma per la Llengua, the agent says he has linguistic rights not to use Catalan, calls the request to speak it fascist and tells the woman: «Yo no quiero hablar con usted». She had asked why the officers wanted her identification after they suspected she was trying to enter a restricted area.
Plataforma per la Llengua submitted a formal complaint to Barcelona’s mayor in December 2025, along with the recording and a transcript. The organisation argued that the refusal breached the woman’s right to deal with the administration in Catalan under article 33 of the Estatut d'autonomia, as well as the Ajuntament’s rules on the use of Catalan. Those rules require municipal staff to begin interactions in Catalan, then adapt to the language chosen by the member of the public. The council examined the material and opened a disciplinary case, which led to the suspension. The sanction concerned public-service conduct and treatment; it did not generally prohibit officers from speaking Spanish.
The Guardia Urbana is Barcelona’s municipal police force, distinct from the Guardia Civil, whose Tarragona explosives unit was covered in separate policing coverage. Plataforma per la Llengua says complaints about linguistic discrimination by police are often closed without action. Its president, Òscar Escuder, said: «Esta resolución demuestra que las discriminaciones lingüísticas por parte de los cuerpos policiales no son una percepción subjetiva ni una cuestión menor» (“This ruling shows that linguistic discrimination by police forces is not a subjective perception or a minor matter”, translated from Spanish).
The disciplinary decision does not settle the separate case over the woman’s fine. She was accused of verbally confronting and disparaging officers; Plataforma per la Llengua, which is providing her legal defence, says she was asserting her language rights. After the Ajuntament rejected her appeal, the case moved to the administrative courts.
Plataforma per la Llengua recorded 33 complaints against the Guàrdia Urbana between 2021 and October 2026, compared with nearly 40 against the Mossos d'Esquadra over the same period. Ara also reported 52 linguistic complaints concerning security forces in 2026, including four involving Barcelona’s Guardia Urbana. In October 2026, the Guàrdia Urbana’s Prefecture sent agents an internal circular urging them to speak Catalan among themselves and begin public interactions in that language. It reiterated the general rule that the first verbal interaction with citizens should take place in Catalan.
