The solid arguments of the Supreme Court to reject the amnesty for corrupt politicians

@ElentirENG ES 7·01·2024 · 15:29 0

One of the last dams that Spain has to defend the Rule of Law is Justice, and specifically the judges who fulfill their duty.

Statement of the General Council of the Judiciary of Spain against the amnesty: it is “a serious violation of fundamental rights”
Amnesty law in Spain: the list of deputies who have supported this colossal act of corruption

The act of corruption of the Sánchez government with the amnesty

This Monday, the Supreme Court has poured cold water on the Pedro Sánchez government's plans to erase the criminal record of its separatist allies, an erasure that is payment for the support of the parties of these criminals to Sánchez's re-election. A deal with the law that has become one of the biggest corruption scandals in our democracy, done publicly and with absolute shamelessness.

El Tribunal Supremo declara no amnistiado el delito de malversación

This afternoon, the Supreme Court published a statement stating that declares the crime of embezzlement of public funds in the cause of the "procés", that is, the separatist coup perpetrated in 2017 by Sánchez's current allies, who sought to subvert the rule of law to break national unity and separate Catalonia from the rest of Spain.

The informative note of the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court (see PDF) offers solid arguments that undermine the government's attempt to erase the crimes of its allies and also recriminates , that claim to the socialists and their parliamentary allies: "it is especially difficult to reconcile the effort of the European Union to eliminate margins of impunity for embezzlers with the will of the Spanish legislator to provide exceptional treatment and personalized to crimes of special seriousness, for the simple fact of having been committed by specific political leaders and in a certain historical period", indicates the judicial decision. The text adds:

"The legislator has deemed it necessary to open a parenthesis to one hundred years of jurisprudence and to do so for some very specific facts and protagonists. A parenthesis that will be closed again for all other citizens who have been convicted of a crime of the same nature."

It is a devastating reproach to the government for granting criminal privileges to its allies and attacking the right to equality before the law that the Spanish Constitution protects in its Article 14, an attitude inappropriate for a democratic government .

The Court points out that the defendants obtained a personal benefit from this embezzlement

Furthermore, the Second Chamber points out that the crimes of embezzlement committed by the leaders of the separatist coup cannot be amnestied because they obtained a personal benefit of a patrimonial nature, something that the law itself agreed upon by the government and its allies leaves out of the amnesty: "from the first moments of codified law, the profit motive has been considered perfectly compatible with any other purpose. He who takes possession of other people's property - in this case, public assets - commits a crime even if the money obtained is used as gifts to third parties, alms or any other altruistic cause. Punishment in property crimes is not justified for 'keeping someone else's things', but for 'take things from another'".

The decision of the Second Chamber indicates that the accused "did with the assets of others that were entrusted to them what they could not or did not want to do with their assets. They used them for their own personal objectives, that not because they are political, they also stop having that particular or sectarian aspect. Public funds put at the service of their purposes that were also private, although they could be shared by a greater or lesser number of people. financing of electoral campaigns, of goals with political significance, of propaganda or the implementation of one's own political ideas, even if it has an idealistic aspect, it does not fail to also report a very personal benefit that takes on a patrimonial nature when it has reported significant savings." The text adds:

"Everyone's money served to not diminish the money of a few. In short, they obtained a personal benefit of a patrimonial nature. The leaders who are currently serving sentences contributed to the purposes described in article 1 of the Amnesty Law but, unlike the rest of the citizens who extracted their personal contribution to the secessionist political process from their assets and who saw their assets reduced as a result, those did not suffer the same loss as they made use of the public assets, beyond the fact that -it is indifferent- they may or may not have also allocated personal funds. Its main contribution diminishes in any way. Their contribution was public money that they had to guard and administer with loyalty."

The Court warns about the "weakening of the territorial strength of Spain"

Below, the text adds this other argument in relation to that separatist coup:

"The weakening of the territorial strength of Spain and of the European Union itself was real. The structural bases on which the European project has been built were put at risk, despite that danger, from of the political vicissitudes that are already part of history, would not materialize in an effective territorial fragmentation that would have, without a doubt, had disastrous tax revenue consequences, more than foreseeable, for the European Union.

It is immaterial that the objective for these purposes was not achieved, as it would be if embezzlement for clearly private purposes - think of the acquisition of a property - had remained in the attempted phase. It is the potential to harm financial interests that excludes conduct from benefit, not the actual harm."

A judicial decision that exposes the government of Pedro Sánchez

This judicial decision leaves the Sánchez government in a bad place for its decision to amnesty those crimes committed by its allies, a decision with which the socialists put their party interests before the general interest, causing serious damage to our Rule of Lawand a clear discredit to our institutions, diminishing their moral authority to demand compliance with the law from all Spaniards, by granting a few the privilege of committing crimes with total impunity for the mere fact that the government needs their support. It is an abuse of power and an act of corruption for which the government should end up being held accountable in court, in addition to resigning immediately. Spain cannot remain in the hands of a government that erases the crimes of corruption committed by its allies.

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Photo: Luis García.