Portugal's prisons currently hold 58 people convicted of forest-fire offenses and 41 more suspects awaiting trial, according to data reported by Jornal de Notícias (JN). Including people serving sentences outside prison, under house arrest, or subject to other judicial measures, JN reported that the country's justice system has 329 people linked to forest-fire crimes under some form of judicial supervision.
Official Justice Statistics cited by JN show that the number of prison inmates convicted specifically of forest-fire offenses rose from 34 at the end of 2015 to 65 at the end of 2025, a 91 percent increase over the decade. The latest DGRSP data, however, put the current number at 58. JN reported that all inmates in both the 2015 and latest datasets were Portuguese men.
The GNR, Portugal's national guard, detained 155 people on suspicion of forest-fire crimes in the first nearly seven months of 2026, through July 27, as part of nationwide surveillance, inspection, and criminal investigation efforts, according to GNR figures. The GNR recorded 5,301 forest-fire crimes in 2025, according to the same figures.
A separate academic study, published online in February 2024 in the journal Psychology, Crime & Law, examined the criminal records of 450 rural arsonists in Portugal. The researchers, Rita Ribeiro, Duarte Teles, Luís Proença, Iris Almeida, and Cristina Soeiro, found mental-health and/or alcohol problems in 61 percent of the cases they examined. The group had an average age in the mid-40s; most were employed and had no prior criminal record. The study classified the offenders into three groups: two "expressive" categories, associated respectively with mental-health problems and alcohol use, and an "instrumental" category involving offenders whose behavior was more calculated. The two expressive categories accounted for the large majority of cases.