The PSOE maneuver to reduce the crime of embezzlement will bring political, public and legal consequences. Despite the fact that the socialist bench has tried to defend that this modification will not benefit the corrupt, the main battering ram in this fight, the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor, believes that the effects will be “perverse”, as sources acknowledge. of the department headed by Alejandro Luzón.
According to the government’s plans, the reform will be approved next week once voted in the Senate. The consequences could be practically immediate, as Anticorruption maintains.
To begin with, one of the cases that will be affected is the one known as Operation Kitchen. The main defendants, the former Minister of the Interior Jorge Fernández Díaz and his former number two Francisco Martínez would benefit from the reform, as tax sources have recognized, because now the penalty for the crime of embezzlement is reduced when there is no personal gain .
In this specific case, Anti-Corruption accuses the Interior leadership of using public funds to orchestrate an operation to steal documents from former PP treasurer Luis Bárcenas, and whose content could implicate the then Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy in illegal financing of the party.
According to these sources, the indictment is already prepared, waiting for the National Court to deliver the necessary documentation. However, if this does not arrive before the publication in the Official State Gazette (BOE) of the new articles of the crime of embezzlement, they would be forced to modify the accusation.
Anti-corruption warns that the reform will force the review of sentences already imposed, as has already happened after the approval of the law of only yes is yes, in the case of those convicted of sexual abuse or assault.
But the consequences are going to have bigger tentacles. According to tax sources, in addition to the reduction in sentences, it could affect fines and civil liabilities that have not yet been paid. This means that they will have to be reduced.
And to that is added another third drift, which is the statute of limitations for crimes. Anti-corruption already manages data on possible case files as the years of prescription are reduced, which will force them to stop investigating certain matters.
With all this, Anti-Corruption sources point out that the reform is hasty because it has not had the mandatory reports from the CGPJ, the Council of State and the Fiscal Council, which could have warned of these consequences and taken them into consideration.
They also maintain that the text is “confusing” and that, despite the compromise amendment announced, embezzlement as unfair administration does not remain exactly the same as it was.
Regarding the possibility of appealing final sentences, despite the fact that the Government defends that there is a transitory provision that prevents it, these same sources indicate that criminal retroactivity in favor of the accused cannot be forgotten. In any case, the last word will be the Supreme Court.
