The judge investigating the Tsunami case in the National Court has denied the request of ERC leader Marta Rovira to testify on May 22 by videoconference from Switzerland, considering that it would delay the investigation, and has summoned her to do so from Barcelona, where your address appears.
In an order issued this Thursday, Judge Manuel García-Castellón has agreed to postpone sine die the statement of Josep Lluís Alay, advisor to the former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont, scheduled that same day, given that his lawyer, Gonzalo Boye, had indicated a trial on that day.
The rest of those investigated for the crime of terrorism in the National Court for the riots attributed to the Tsunami Democràtic platform in the fall of 2019 in response to the procés sentence will have to give statements next Wednesday by videoconference from Barcelona.
Also the general secretary of ERC, Marta Rovira, who unsuccessfully requested to appear from Switzerland.
The judge has not accepted because, as he argues in his resolution, the videoconference system “is contemplated in order to expedite the course of the proceedings” and avoid delays, and to declare electronically from Switzerland an international rogatory commission would have to be filed.
That, the judge continues, would delay the proceedings “in an unwanted and unnecessary manner,” when videoconferencing is appropriate “when it can be implemented in an agile manner, which happens” when it is used in the same country. Furthermore, the magistrate specifies that in the case of Rovira, the address stated in the proceedings is in Barcelona.
Among those investigated who will also have to give a statement by videoconference next Wednesday are, in addition to Rovira, the former ERC councilor Xavier Vendrell, the leader of Òmnium Cultural Oleguer Serra and the businessman Oriol Soler, among others.
