Judge Juan Carlos Peinado took an unexpected step last week by placing Begoña Gómez one step away from the bench. The Minister of the Presidency, Justice and Relations with the Courts, Félix Bolaños, reacted that same day. “It has embarrassed many judges and magistrates,” he said. The response was immediate and several judicial associations criticized his comment. The Francisco de Vitoria Judicial Association (AJFV) – the second in number of members – even sent him a letter accusing him of pointing out a robed man with a “personal attack.” Bolaños has responded in the same way, claiming his right to make a “legitimate criticism” of a situation, that of this case, that he considers “abnormal.”
In the letter, to which EL PAÍS has had access, the minister clarifies that there has been no “signaling or personal attack whatsoever.” ”I do not make any personal disqualifying reference to the instructor,” he emphasizes. Bolaños frames his words in “a legitimate criticism of certain judicial resolutions”, in the exercise of his fundamental right to freedom of expression, and “from total respect and confidence in the Judiciary as a whole, and in the system of guarantees and resources of our Rule of Law.” “In fact, that’s how I expressed it and I will continue to do it with all the respect and restraint, as I always do,” he continues.
The minister states that he has limited himself to highlighting “an objective and extraordinary fact that affects this case: around fifteen resolutions issued by this magistrate in the investigation of a single procedure have been partially or totally annulled by the Provincial Court and the Supreme Court.” Added to this is that the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) has yet to resolve several complaints against Peinado, including one of his own. In his opinion, “this circumstance cannot be described as usual.” “Quite the contrary, it is very abnormal,” he says, defending that denouncing this “does not imply any personal disqualification, but rather making an assessment of an unquestionably exceptional reality.”
Furthermore, it rules out that judicial independence and the separation of powers may be “minimally affected”, not only by his words, but by “any public statement”, given that “the right to reasoned criticism constitutes a nuclear manifestation of the fundamental right to freedom of expression.” Specifically, he maintains that “legal criticism” of judicial resolutions is protected by the Constitution.
Despite this disagreement, Bolaños recognizes the “essential work” of the judicial associations, ratifying his “full willingness” to maintain “a loyal and constructive institutional dialogue,” as until now. “I am convinced that the strengthening of our institutions requires the normal assumption of the existence of an informed and plural public debate, in which I will participate and always work seeking to improve the public service of justice and the defense of the good name of justice,” he says goodbye.
In this way, Bolaños responds to the AJFV, which wrote to him to inform him that it considers it “inadmissible” that there are “personal attacks from the Executive against those who exercise jurisdiction.” “We are not facing a legal discrepancy raised through ordinary channels. We are facing statements made by the executive branch about an identified judge and regarding an ongoing procedure,” the judicial association stated. For the AJFV, “a Government can disagree with judicial resolutions,” but “what it cannot do is convert that discrepancy into a personal accusation.” In his opinion, “the seriousness is even greater when the person who does it is precisely the Minister of Justice, who is responsible for acting with prudence, restraint and respect towards other powers of the State.” For this reason, he urged him to put an end to what he described as a “dynamic of confrontation with the Judiciary.”
Peinado’s last decision
The trigger for this latest controversy were the statements that Bolaños made to the press after learning of the latest decision by the head of the Court of Instruction Number 41 of Madrid. “I think it has embarrassed many citizens of our country. It has embarrassed many judges and magistrates in our country. I believe that the damage that has been done to the good name of justice is damage that, surely, in many aspects will be irreparable. But, nevertheless, my absolute confidence that a higher court, an impartial court, will revoke the decisions that are being adopted in this investigation. I have no doubt that in this case, where there is nothing, no matter how much it is stirred, nothing can be established,” said the minister.
Peinado proposed trying the wife of the President of the Government for four crimes – embezzlement, influence peddling, business corruption and brand misappropriation – after two years of a controversial investigation. He left out the fifth crime for which he had been investigating her (professional intrusion), but insisted that Gómez allegedly took advantage of her relationship with Pedro Sánchez to influence authorities and officials and boost her private career with the development of a professorship that she co-directed at the Complutense University of Madrid (UCM). He also proposed trying Gómez’s personal assistant, Cristina Álvarez, for those same crimes, and the businessman Juan Carlos Barrabés, for influence peddling and business corruption.
The popular accusation led by Hazte Oír has already submitted a brief requesting penalties for a hypothetical jury trial. For Gómez, he requests a sentence of up to 24 years in prison; 22, for Álvarez; and 6, for Barrabés. The defenses, for their part, have appealed the court decision. “It gives the impression that they are trying to reach an objective, even if it is at the cost of massacring the truth,” Gómez recriminates in his challenge brief before the Provincial Court of Madrid. The Prosecutor’s Office has also claimed the file, reproaching Peinado for having caused “deliberate confusion” in the story of the events to try to “draw” crimes in the face of “their nonexistence.” “Regardless of ethical or aesthetic considerations, of the convenience or inconvenience of certain actions, the mere marital relationship of Begoña Gómez cannot operate (…) as an influence,” maintains the public ministry.
