The president of the Supreme Court, Francisco Marín Castán, has suspended a few hours before the meeting he had planned with the Minister of the Presidency, Justice and Relations with the Cortes, Félix Bolaños, for noon today alleging “supervening” reasons after the criticism expressed in Congress and the Senate to some judges by parliamentarians from Junts, investiture partners of Pedro Sánchez. Subsequently, Bolaños and Marín Castán held a telephone conversation and rescheduled the meeting for next Tuesday, December 19, at the headquarters of the High Court, according to ministry sources.
Legal sources have explained that the causes of the suspension are in these statements with direct attacks on, among others, the former president of the Supreme Court, Carlos Lesmes, the president of the Criminal Chamber of the TS who led the trial of the leaders of the process in 2019, Manuel Marchena, the instructor of the case, Pablo Llarena, and Judge Carmen Lamela.
In fact, the president of the High Court himself issued a statement this afternoon in which he warned that “the personal attack in Parliament against the former president of the Supreme Court, a president of the Chamber and two magistrates of the court is unprecedented and not “corresponds to the minimum requirements of the separation of powers in a rule of law.”
Shortly after the statement, the Minister of Justice conveyed to the President of the Supreme Court the words that he spoke both yesterday and today in Parliament: “Spain is a State of law, with full democracy and judges act with independence and separation of powers.” and “I am going to work for the prestige of the judges and magistrates in this country in the face of any attack, wherever it comes from.”
Ministry sources have insisted that judges can count on the Minister of Justice to defend them from any disqualification and questioning of their prestige and to guarantee that they can dispense justice independently, within the framework of the Constitution, the rule of law and the separation of powers.
The president of the CGPJ, Vicente Guilarte, had also spoken out with another similar statement in which he warned that “the accusation – and the purpose that emerges from it – of several judges of the Supreme Court is inadmissible in a State of Law, one of whose fundamental principles is the separation of powers”.
Guilarte pointed out that “the indicated persons, and any other member of the judicial career who may find themselves in the same circumstances, will find in the institution that I preside the firmest opposition to these attacks in defense of the jurisdictional work carried out by all of them, to the “I express my express support and guarantee that, in the exercise of the powers that the law attributes to the CGPJ, the necessary measures provided for by the legal system will be adopted to protect its independence.”
Since the amnesty law was registered in Congress, the pro-independence parties and even some members of the Executive have spoken publicly about lawfare, that is, the judicial persecution against political leaders. During yesterday’s parliamentary debate, Tuesday, Junts spokesperson in Congress, Míriam Nogueras, branded judges Llarena, Marchena, Lesmes and Lamela, among others, as “indecent characters” who “in a normal country would be dismissed.” and judged immediately.
“Guys like Colonel Baena, better known on social networks as Tácito or Pérez de los Cobos, the two brothers, the one who is a judge and the one who is a police officer, in collaboration with other people like Marchena, complicit in the politicization of the police and Spanish justice, along with other indecent characters such as Espejel, Lesmes, Llarena, Lamela and many others in a normal country would be dismissed and tried immediately. Instead of this in the Kingdom of Spain all these people have free rein to continue to twist the law and also the rights, they also have free rein to accuse many Catalan independentists, just for being independentists, of being terrorists,” Nogueras said yesterday.
Likewise, in the Senate, the representative of Junts Josep Lluís Cleries accused the togados of launching a “political battle” to “try to torpedo” the amnesty law. Faced with such statements, Bolaños himself came out in defense of the judges and their independence.
“I do not at all share the criticism that you make of the judges and the Judiciary. Spain is a rule of law, a full democracy and the judges act independently and with separation of powers,” said the Minister of Justice in response to Claries .
Given the statements and insinuations of recent days – also against the judge of the National Court Manuel García -Castellón or against the Barcelona Prosecutor’s Office – the president of the Supreme Court has decided to avoid the photograph with the Minister of Justice, contrary to what he did a few days ago the president of the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ).
Vicente Guilarte received Bolaños while his government partner, Sumar, filed a complaint against the conservative members of the judges’ body for prevarication for promoting a statement against the amnesty law when it has not yet been approved in Parliament.
The Supreme Court is now studying adopting some type of measure regarding the attacks leveled against its judges in recent weeks.