The Court of Barcelona has acquitted the head of the Local Police of Pineda de Mar (Maresme), Carles Santacreu, accused of pressuring a hotel chain together with two PSC councilors in 2017 to expel the CNP (National Police Corps) agents. Police) who had lodged for 1-O.
The sentence of the sixth section, exonerates Santacreu, and confirms the sentences to the councilors Carme Aragonès, who was deputy mayor of Pineda in October 2017; and Jordi Masnou, still deputy mayor of the town, who reached an agreement of conformity and recognized the facts.
The two councilors accepted one year in prison and another year of disqualification after assuming that on the night of October 2, 2017 both appeared together with Santacreu at a hotel belonging to the Checkin de Pineda chain where agents destined for Catalonia were staying on 1-O .
After crossing the access door to the hotel, the municipal delegation asked to meet with the management of the establishment, entering the office of the director, before whom Aragonès, as the highest local authority because the mayor was out of Pineda, supported by Masnou, summoned him to evacuate the contingent of national police staying in two hotels in Pineda belonging to the same chain.
The hotel manager, when they both informed him that he had to evict the police, called the manager of the chain, to whom Carme Aragonès reiterated the request to expel the agents, according to the sentence.
The manager of the chain refused, since he had a contract that forced him to stay, although Masnou insisted and told him that they had to evict them “yes or yes”, “that they knew how to close them” and that, if he did not agree, they would “It would have problems in case of solving possible administrative deficiencies.”
The court considers that the manager finally agreed “for fear that the announced reprisals would be carried out if he did not attend to the eviction petition of the CNP members.”
The manager of the hotel chain wrote a letter, which he sent to the hotel manager, explaining that they were evicting the agents for fear that all hotels would be closed for 5 years.
Regarding the role of Santacreu, although he gave Aragonès protection in his role as accidental mayoress and was present at the meeting with the hotel manager, the court considers that he did not intervene, and also that he was in civilian clothes and unarmed.
The sentence states that the policeman did not intervene in the telephone conversation between the two PSC councilors and the hotel manager, and that it is not proven that he knew the full content of what Masnou and the person in charge of the chain spoke about.
The court states that the presence of the agent was “logical and even obligatory”, since it is the mayor himself who tells him to go give protection to Carme Aragonès, and that both she and Masnou were councilors of the municipal government, a team that on the day previous one was against to the celebration of the voting of the 1-O.
At the gates of the hotel where the national policemen of 1-O were staying, protest rallies were held, which led to moments of tension, in the tense days after the unilateral referendum.
