The Supreme Court judge who instructed the procés case, Pablo Llarena, still has to definitively close the matter regarding the former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont. The magistrate opposed applying the Amnesty law to the post-convergent leader, understanding that he personally profited from organizing the October 1, 2017 referendum and therefore is excluded from this legal benefit. Legal sources explained yesterday, in the discussions following the opening of the Judicial Year, that the magistrate will review the application of the law of criminal oblivion as soon as the Constitutional Court evaluates the interpretation made by the instructor. His thesis, that the leaders of the procés enriched themselves by organizing the 1-O because they did so with public money and not personal funds, is the same maintained by the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court regarding those already convicted, such as former vice president Oriol Junqueras who requested to be granted amnesty and have his disqualification penalty canceled. All of them appealed to the Constitutional Court, which on the 22nd will review the first of the protection appeals.
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The guarantees body already endorsed the constitutionality of the Amnesty law but did not assess whether in these specific cases the exception contemplated in the law applies to exclude those who, according to the Supreme Court, have enriched themselves with public money during the procés.
The Constitutional Court will study the first appeal in two weeks, filed by the former minister and secretary general of Junts Jordi Turull. Legal sources indicate that Llarena will not wait for the court to resolve the protection appeal filed by Puigdemont against Llarena’s interpretation. Since all appeals are based on the same argument, the instructor plans, once the Constitutional Court issues its interpretation on embezzlement, to apply it to Puigdemont. This would mean that the first thing he would do is lift the national arrest warrant against the Catalan politician, which has forced him to live outside Spain since 2017.
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However, court sources recall that the rapporteur of Turull’s appeal is the conservative magistrate José María Macías. The expectation is that his report will confirm Llarena’s interpretation, a position that might not be supported by the progressive majority. This scenario would require another magistrate to take over the report, which would delay this first resolution and therefore Puigdemont’s return.
The Court of Auditors plans to apply it
The Court of Auditors is reportedly finalizing its favorable decision to apply the Amnesty law to 35 defendants in the procés. According to sources from this court consulted by EFE, the counselor of the Second Department of Trial of the court is only pending responding to a reconsideration appeal from one of the parties before resolving in the coming days the application of the Amnesty law for these cases. According to Catalunya Ràdio, the court’s decision to apply criminal oblivion to them is already made, so the pending cases before the highest public sector control body and accounting jurisdiction will be dropped. On July 24, the Generalitat of Catalonia formally requested the court to apply the rule to the pro-independence leaders pending to benefit from it and to lift the precautionary measures ordered.
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