The magistrates of the Provincial Court of Madrid have agreed to apply in the revisions of sentences for the entry into force of the Law of Comprehensive Guarantee of Sexual Freedom, known as
only yes is yes
, the most favorable criterion for the prisoner, as reported this Friday by the Superior Court of Justice of Madrid in a note.
In this way, the magistrates have distanced themselves from the position of the State Attorney General's Office, which a few days ago indicated to its prosecutors that from now on they do not support, "as a general rule", the reduction of sentences in the event that the penalty originally imposed was within the range of penalties provided for in the new law.
The decision of the Provincial Court of Madrid has been adopted by 32 votes in favor, eight against and nine abstentions.
The provincial courts of Granada, Bizkaia and Malaga have resolved in the same sense, and the ones in Zaragoza and Córdoba had also done so before.
La Rioja, meanwhile, shares criteria with the Prosecutor's Office for the majority of cases,
but it does not rule out lowering the sentences of those affected by the reduction of the minimum sentences included in the new law.
The decision of Las Palmas is similar, which has agreed to lower ex officio only the sentences in which the maximum sentence has been lowered and, in the rest of the cases, including those that had the minimum sentence with the previous law, to analyze "case by case ”.
The judges of the 15 criminal sections of the Provincial Court of Madrid have decided that, in cases in which the minimum sentence was initially applied to the sexual offender, the ruling will be reviewed to impose the new minimum sentence, as has already been done. happened in several cases in that community.
The argument is that it is necessary to comply with the basic criminal principle that the convicted person has the right to the retroactive application of the law when it favors him.
In addition to the presidents of the sections, the meeting was joined by other magistrates who were not obliged to go, but who have come voluntarily, up to 49. "These are agreements adopted in meetings of magistrates that do not have the value of jurisprudence, being its usefulness for internal consumption, and that it constitutes a valuable instrument to discuss doubtful procedural issues or on which there are discrepancies", specifies the TSJM in its statement.
A judicial source points out that "there has hardly been a debate" and that almost all those present were clear that the lack of a transitory provision in the
law of only yes is yes
forced to opt for the decision finally adopted.
"This was practically the only point on the table in a meeting that was quite brief," says this source.
The decision, in any case, has not gone ahead unanimously but by 32 yeses, eight noes and nine abstentions.
On Monday, the State Attorney General, Álvaro García Ortiz, issued a decree ordering prosecutors to oppose reviewing sentences for sexual offenders when the original sentence is included in the range of sentences contemplated in the new law.
In other words, if an aggressor was sentenced to a minimum sentence of six years and that sentence is now included in the range of sentences of the new law, even if it is no longer the minimum possible, it will be maintained.
García Ortiz also pointed out, however, that each case should be analyzed individually.
There are already several provincial Courts that have unified criteria with which to operate, waiting for the Supreme Court to establish doctrine on how these penalties should be reviewed after the entry into force of the
law of
only yes is yes
.
Almost all the hearings that have ruled so far have done so against the criteria of the public ministry, although it also warned that it would be necessary to go case by case based on the specific considerations included in each sentence.
The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, has once again asked for time this Friday: "The State Attorney General's Office has already ruled, it has unified criteria for the application of the law and there have been provincial hearings that have positioned themselves in favor of a reading , [and] others from another.
As president, I think it is important to wait for the Supreme Court to rule so that all this doctrine is unified and we guarantee the safety of women among all ”,
Sánchez has said, reports
José Marcos.
The judges of La Rioja and Zaragoza were the first to debate how to deal with the review of sentences without waiting for the ruling of the high court, but in these meetings divergent conclusions have been reached.
While the Court of La Rioja decided —in line with the Prosecutor's Office— to apply the transitory provision of the 1995 Penal Code that allows not to lower sentences in certain cases, the other magistrates have interpreted that this transitory provision only refers to possible revisions of judgments that year.
In this way, La Rioja denied the review to 54 inmates, while Zaragoza will begin to review ex officio rulings in the coming weeks.
This Friday the magistrates of Bizkaia and Las Palmas have also met.
The Basques have agreed that they will review the final sentences ex officio and that they will apply the reduction of sentences as long as it favors the prisoner.
The Canarian judges, for their part, have decided not to review ex officio, except when "there are doubts that it could be subject to a possible modification that favors the prisoner."
Two hundred sentences under review
In the 15 criminal sections of the Madrid Court there are 447 cases of sexual abuse and assault with final convictions and subject to review after the entry into force of the
law of only yes is yes
.
The magistrates have already begun the review of 121 and are processing another 55 at the request of the lawyers of the convicted.
“As a consequence of the review that has been carried out so far in the Madrid courts, the sentence has been reduced in 20 cases, and in seven
procedures, the release [of the convicted person] has been decreed, with the exception that in one case the prisoner continues to serve a sentence by having a final conviction for other crimes,” according to the data provided this Friday by the TSJM.
In the rest of Spain, at least 14 sentence reductions have been registered since the entry into force of the law.
In nine cases, the reduction has included the release of the inmates.