The judge of the Audiencia Nacional Manuel García Castellón has agreed to raise a reasoned statement to the Supreme Court to investigate for a crime of terrorism in the cause of the Democratic Tsunami the former president of the Generalitat and member of the European Parliament Carles Puigdemont, the leader of ERC Marta Rovira and ten other people.
In his reasoned exposition, the magistrate points out that to clarify the facts it is necessary to carry out investigative procedures that cannot be carried out because Puigdemont and the deputy of the Parliament of Catalonia Rubén Wagensberg are absent. The judge has taken a step forward against the criteria of the Prosecutor’s Office, which sees no evidence against the former president or of terrorism in the entire judicial case compared to others investigated.
Now the Criminal Chamber of the high court, chaired by Manuel Marchena, must decide whether to accept the instruction or return it to García-Castellón so that he can try to carry out all possible procedures before its referral. This matter comes to the fore amid accusations of ‘lawfare’ and criticism of the magistrate, who has requested protection from the General Council of the Judiciary.
In parallel to García-Castellón’s decision, the acting president of the Criminal Chamber of the National Court, Alfonso Guevara, has opened a government file in which he agrees to request from the instructor the recusal document presented by one of the investigated in the Tsunami case, Oleguer Serra, who was inadmissible by providence on November 15.
The president of the Chamber thus follows the brief presented by Serra’s defense in which he informs of the inadmissibility of his recusal through an order and indicates that the Criminal Chamber should be competent to resolve the incidents of abstention and recusal. of the central investigative magistrates-judges of the National Court” and that is why it asks you to request the recusal document from the judge so that the Chamber can decide.
The magistrate continues with the case, with the shadow of the amnesty law hanging over the matter. According to the text presented by the PSOE, with the endorsement of the pro-independence parties, any case investigated for terrorism linked to the process will be amnestied as long as there is no final ruling, that is, a trial has been held, and all judicial instances have reviewed the fault. However, as long as the law is not approved, the courts can continue with their judicial investigations.
The magistrate’s letter to the Supreme Court indicates that Carles Puigdemont would be located at the “highest vertex of the Tsunami Democratic (TD) organization” and adds that his position as former president and leader of the independence movement from Brussels gives him “a position of unquestionable authority.” .
As the judge explains, there are indications that allow us to infer his participation in the birth and planning of the Tsunami actions. Among these indications, he explains, are the messages via mobile phone between the investigated Josep Lluís Alay – head of his office – and Jesús Rodríguez, the notes from the former’s agenda or Puigdemont’s promotion through Twitter of the launch of the Tsunami platform.
Puigdemont’s leadership role in Tsunami is also inferred, the instructor continues, from a conversation held with the investigated Josep Campmajó – writer and businessman – in which they discuss the attitude that Catalan political leaders are having in relation to the sentence of the processes.
Throughout the writing, the head of the Central Court of Instruction 6 remembers the actions of TD as the response to the Supreme Court ruling in the process trial, such as the general strike of October 18, 2019, the attempt to affect the November general elections or the blockade of critical State or European Infrastructures such as the actions carried out at the Barcelona-El Prat airport and the ENAIRE control tower in Barcelona-Gavà.
In relation to the latter, the magistrate highlights the “strategic importance of this objective, and the serious consequences that the success of the intended action could have had for the safety of national and international air traffic.”
The judge explains to the Supreme Court that if TD had achieved its objective of preventing the shift change of the facility’s air traffic controllers, “this would not only have caused economic damage, but could have had a catastrophic result with unforeseeable consequences for the people who At that moment they were in flight aboard the aircraft in the area under control, with the obvious risk and danger to their lives.”
For the judge, the impact it had on the lives and integrity of people cannot be minimized, and he must emphasize that within the framework of this action the death of a person occurred, as reported by the media at that time. For this reason, he considers it necessary to find out if the collapse of the airport could have played a role in the fatal outcome in some way. “In other words, it would try to rule out that the death (…) could have been avoided on October 14, 2019.”
For the magistrate, it is relevant that the riots lasted until the early hours of the morning on the 15th, resulting in multiple injuries, including both agents of the Security Forces and Corps and civilians.
For this reason, the magistrate considers that the investigation must clarify who the injured were, with the corresponding offer of actions, and decide whether the harmful results are equally attributable to those responsible for the organization being investigated.
In his opinion, it will be “especially relevant” to clarify whether among the injured there were airport users (travellers, flight crew, companions or relatives of travelers or airport staff), in order to specify the risk to the physical integrity of the passengers. people who were at the airport was the action organized by Tsunami.
“Not only were damages caused to people, but also significant economic damages were caused that the investigation must specify if they are objectively attributable to those responsible for the organization,” he warns.
In his reasoned presentation, the judge explains that at this procedural moment the classification cannot be considered in exclusive terms, but rather, the seriousness of the facts and their complexity allow them to be subsumed into various infractions that would fit into acts of terrorism in the sense provided by the European Union Law.
The magistrate maintains that the violent acts that occurred on October 14, 2019 at the Prat Airport were an “illegal action”, in the broadest sense of the word since there is no evidence that there was any legal call to carry out an demonstration or meeting. He recalls that it is not possible to authorize demonstrations and concentrations in a critical facility such as Barcelona Airport.
This action, according to the magistrate, fits into the Penal Code due to material damage, injured people, the physical integrity of those present at the airport facility and the impact on air traffic.
The judge adds that the reports sent by the Mossos de Escuadra have revealed the use of devices, substances and weapons in the action to block the airport by the protesters, “This is how they talk about the use of large stones coming from uprooting the marble and granite on the floor and had sharp edges; 2-meter-long iron from the building’s fencing; glass from the breaking of the building structures; high-power pyrotechnics, empty fire extinguishers, luggage carts, wood, glass, fences, pallets, metal parts, etc. There is also talk of a kind of projectile with which metal pieces were launched, a kind of slingshot with which an agent would have been injured.”
In his account of the events, the magistrate recalls that the assailants accessed the boarding area, managed to settle in front of the boarding doors to access the planes, preventing passengers from accessing them, and managed to block the tower. air control of El Prat and that with their action they endangered the safety of the airport and national and international air traffic “if the MMEE had not cleared the path that prevented the relief of air traffic controllers from the ENAIRE control tower” .
This danger, according to García Castellón, could materialize in the death of a citizen of French nationality.
On the other hand, García Castellón analyzes the acts committed, in light of the International Conventions for the repression of illicit acts against civil aviation security, and concludes that “given that several of those investigated in this procedure are outside of Spain , specifically in Switzerland and Belgium, countries that have signed the aforementioned Conventions”.
This means – according to what he says – that, in the event that the prosecution of these events cannot take place in Spain, the possibility of prosecuting the events at El Prat airport in one of said countries could remain safe, “if use is made of the appropriate judicial cooperation mechanisms by the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court.”
In his reasoned exposition, the magistrate indicates that once the figure of sedition, repealed last year, has been ruled out, the first step “would be to examine whether we could be faced with a crime of public disorder committed by a structured criminal organization”, to which an organization would be added established with the purpose of committing terrorist actions.
