Friday, March 29

The repeal of the sedition does not entail the immediate rehabilitation of Junqueras nor does it speed up the return of Puigdemont


The repeal of the sedition registered in Congress by the PSOE and United We Can does not imply the immediate rehabilitation of the ERC leader, Oriol Junqueras, nor does it accelerate the eventual return of the former president of the Generalitat, Carles Puigdemont. In the absence of knowing the next movements of the leaders of the procés and the Supreme Court, the crime of embezzlement for which Junqueras was convicted and Puigdemont is claimed continues to be an obstacle in his historical-criminal sheet.

Aragonès vindicates the agreement on the crime of sedition but warns that more changes will be needed

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Unlike other independence leaders, Junqueras was sentenced by the Supreme Court to 13 years in prison and disqualification for a crime of sedition in medial competition with another of aggravated embezzlement. In other words, the court considered that he embezzled public funds to perpetrate the sedition.

Legal sources consulted explain that since there has been no change in the embezzlement, Junqueras’ disqualification does not expire, and that it is not necessary for the Supreme Court to recalculate again the disqualification sentence that remains to be served. In the same situation are the rest of the former ministers convicted of sedition and embezzlement. Other legal voices, however, do believe that the magistrates would have to study whether the facts proven in the sentence are adequate for the new crime and recalculate the penalties.

In addition, the embezzlement for which Junqueras was convicted was of the aggravated type for having spent more than 250,000 euros, which is punishable by between four and eight years in prison and up to 20 years of disqualification.

In a different scenario, however, are those convicted solely of sedition, the former leaders of Òmnium and the ANC, Jordi Sànchez and Jordi Cuixart, the former ministers Joaquim Forn and Josep Rull, and the former president of Parliament, Carme Forcadell. A priori, according to the sources consulted, they could formally ask the Supreme Court for a review of their sentence, although a legal voice suggests that it would be an “exceptional” and “complicated” procedure, given that this type of review is usually requested with the sentenced in prison and not with the prison sentence already extinguished by a pardon, as is the case.

In short, Forcadell, Cuixart, Rull, Forn and Sànchez could request a review by the Supreme Court in relation to the disqualification sentence that they still have to serve, although from the political perspective of their defense all of them have always maintained that they acted under the protection of fundamental rights and did not commit any crime, neither sedition nor new aggravated public disorder.

Puigdemont, slope of Europe

Regarding Puigdemont and the independence leaders who remain abroad, the same thing happens with Junqueras: by continuing the embezzlement, one of the crimes for which the Supreme Court continues to claim Belgium remains intact. Now the Prosecutor’s Office and Judge Pablo Llarena will have to analyze what the change in the Criminal Code entails in extradition requests.

It should be remembered in this regard that Llarena requested Puigdemont’s extradition after the procés sentence in 2019 for the crimes of sedition and embezzlement, but that in the past he also did so for rebellion, the crime for which he was prosecuted in 2018. However, In the past, Judge Llarena rejected Puigdemont’s extradition only for embezzlement after Germany ruled out handing him over for rebellion, sedition and any type of crime against public order.

In any case, the scenario of Puigdemont’s extradition will play out mainly in two processes on which the European Justice will have to decide in the coming months, those related to the scope of his immunity as a MEP and the preliminary questions sent by Llarena to prevent the Belgian judges can deny the extradition of independence leaders due to the danger of violating fundamental rights in Spain.

In this sense, Puigdemont’s lawyer, Gonzalo Boye, has highlighted that the former president’s return is linked to the resolutions of the European courts and not to the changes in the Spanish Penal Code. “The repeal is not a solution for President Puigdemont because the collar is changed but not the dog”, he has sentenced in RAC-1.

The legal sources consulted agree –although they demand caution until seeing the reform in the BOE– in that, eventually, the greatest beneficiary of the reform is the ERC general secretary, Marta Rovira, who has been in Switzerland since 2018 and is not claimed for sedition . In her case, it would be her defense, which is exercised by the hard-working criminal Iñigo Iruín, who would have to go to the Supreme Court to request a review of her situation after Switzerland has said on several occasions that it does not extradite for crimes. politicians.

And those of Barcelona?

The repeal of sedition is also irrelevant for the cases derived from 1-O that have not yet been tried in Spain and that will test the extent to which the “dejudilization” of the procés agreed between the ERC and the PSOE in the framework of the dialogue table. This is the macro-cause followed in Barcelona’s Investigating Court 13 against thirty officials and senior officials for the preparations for 1-O and its appendix in the Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) by affecting two appraised, the MPs and ERC heavyweights Josep Maria Jové and Lluís Salvadó.

Before the end of the year, the Prosecutor’s Office and the State Attorney’s Office can present their indictments, which cannot include sedition or new aggravated disorders (the defendants were not prosecuted for these crimes) but embezzlement. This criminal type would exponentially increase the penalties requested by being punished with a minimum of four years.

The margin of the accusations with the embezzlement is almost nil since the sentence of the Supreme Court considered this crime proven despite the fact that it was not quantified. And furthermore, even if the State Prosecutor’s Office and Advocacy ended up betting on embezzlement in its lowest fork, the TSJC magistrates and the Barcelona Court would have on the table a high request for punishment for this crime by exercising the extreme right of Vox the accusation popular in both causes.

Hence, in political and legal circles it is interpreted that among the “open issues” that, in the opinion of Pere Aragonès, still remain to be resolved in the dejudicialization folder is a reform of embezzlement to lighten the penal future of dozens of high-ranking positions and officials.



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