First support of the Constitutional Court to the conviction of the 'procés'

The twelve Catalan independence leaders, in the Supreme Court during the trial of the 'procés'.EMILIO NARANJO / EFE

Starting this Tuesday, the Constitutional Court addresses the various appeals filed against the Supreme Court ruling that condemned the Catalan pro-independence leaders.

The Constitutional Court will begin with the appeal of former counselor Meritxell Borràs, sentenced to a disqualification (not prison) sentence for disobedience.

But the proposal that the magistrates will debate includes, according to court sources, an element that will later be extended to the rest of the convicted: the support for the Supreme Court against the defense thesis that the defendants should have been tried by the Superior Court of Catalonia .

The decision that the Constitutional Court adopts this Tuesday on the appeal presented by Borràs - one of the three defendants in the trial of the procés who did not receive prison sentences - will apply to all the other convicts who have formulated similar proposals in their challenges.

The magistrate in charge of drafting the sentencing statement guarantees that the Supreme Court assumed the case against the independence leaders, thus understanding that it was the competent court to judge the facts.

This approach will, therefore, entail the elaboration of a doctrine that can be extended to all the applications for protection presented before the court of guarantees in relation to this process;

In addition, in a matter - that of the alleged lack of competence of the Supreme Court - that the convicted defenses have tried to use from day one to request the annulment of the entire case.

Hence the importance of this first sentence.

There is a second aspect that gives special relevance to this ruling.

It is that the presentation, given by Magistrate Cándido Conde Pumpido, State Attorney General during the mandate of the Socialist Government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, involves a clear reply to the pronouncements of the Belgian justice.

Specifically, to the theses on which the courts of that country have relied to reject the order for the arrest and delivery to Spain of the former Minister of Culture Lluís Puig, who fled with Carles Puigdemont since 2017. This order, issued by the Supreme Court judge Pablo Llarena, has obtained a negative answer based on the argument that Puig was no longer a member of the

Government

of the Generalitat or an autonomous parliamentarian when he was processed by the Supreme Court.

The thesis of the Belgian justice is that Puig then ceased to be measured, and that nothing links him to the rest of the defendants (who maintained the jurisdiction, even after applying Article 155 and intervening Catalan autonomy, because they appeared at the following elections, and members of

Parliament

were elected

).

The Supreme Court held, however, that both Puig and Dolors Bassa, a former Minister of Labor who also did not appear in said elections, should be tried with the rest of the independence leaders, understanding that they enjoyed the same jurisdiction when the events occurred.

Bassa, in fact, was tried and sentenced to 12 years in prison for sedition and embezzlement.

This criterion is the one that the Constitutional Court will now also endorse to reject Borràs' appeal for amparo.

There is a second point of the challenge that may have more travel.

The former Minister of the Interior argued that the fine imposed on her - consisting of the payment of 200 euros a day for ten months - should be annulled because it was considered disproportionate, because it was set without a prior analysis of her personal circumstances.

A similar allegation was made by former Justice Carles Mundó, whose appeal is expected to be the second to be examined by the Constitutional Court, already in February.

The thesis of the disproportionate sanction deserves to be discussed, according to sources close to Constitutional magistrates, because the Supreme Court itself has indicated in various sentences that the amount of the fine penalties must take into account the economic situation of the convicted person.

In the case of the former councilors, the Criminal Chamber considered that their status as former members of the Catalan Executive allowed them to face the penalty imposed, but the defenses allege that it did not record that it had weighed their family or working conditions.

The Junqueras resource

The calendar foreseen by the Constitutional Court would mean addressing in the plenary session corresponding to the month of March the appeals presented by the former councilors Jordi Turull, Josep Rull and the former president of the Catalan National Assembly (ANC) Jordi Sànchez.

All of them - sentenced to between 9 and 12 years in prison - were defended by the same lawyer, Jordi Pina, and their resources are very similar.

It is decided that the last request for protection to be resolved is that of the former vice president of the Generalitat Oriol Junqueras, who is serving the maximum sentence imposed in the trial: 13 years in prison for sedition and embezzlement of public funds.

The Junqueras resource is the most complex.

He raises more than twenty alleged violations of fundamental rights, with special emphasis on the right to political participation, both when he was elected regional parliamentarian in September 2017 and when he obtained a seat in the Congress of Deputies in April 2019.

The purpose of the Constitutional is to reach the parenthesis of August with all the resources against the judgment of the procés resolved, by the described procedure of staggered sentences.

The only doubt is whether a possible renewal of the court of guarantees - whose mandate with the current composition ended more than a year ago - would force a delay in these plans.

The change would mean the replacement of the current president, Juan José González Rivas, and the vice president, Encarna Roca, as well as the magistrate Andrés Ollero and Fernando Valdés Dal-Ré, who resigned last October after being charged in a cause for alleged violence. male chauvinist.

All of them (except Valdés) are responsible for some of the presentations on the procés resources, which would go to their substitutes, who would have to be given some time to prepare their sentencing proposals, which would delay the planned schedule for dictate them.

A challenge with an eye to Strasbourg

The agenda of the next plenary session of the Constitutional Court has not included the deliberation to resolve the challenges presented by those convicted of the trial of the procés against the magistrate Antonio Narváez, although all the procedures on the matter have already been completed.

Narváez was challenged because the pro-independence leaders understand that this magistrate has lost all appearance of impartiality by having described the process as a “covert coup” and compared it with 23-F, to add that the first of these events was “much more serious for its consequences ”that Colonel Antonio Tejero's assault on Congress.

The reason for the delay in deciding on the challenge, according to sources from the court itself, is that there is no unanimity on the decision.

The speaker is the Vice President, Encarna Roca.

For most magistrates, it is very important that a consensus be reached on this matter.

The aim is to avoid having individual votes, because if there are they can weaken the resolution, especially in the face of the more than foreseeable appeals that will be presented to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

This body prosecutes possible violations of the rights recognized in the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms.

Those convicted by the Supreme Court can only go to Strasbourg when the remedies in Spain are exhausted.

The rulings of the Constitutional Court on the challenges presented will put an end to that process and, in the event that their claims are not addressed, the convicted pro-independence leaders may appeal to the European Court.