That the Supreme Court has maintained the embezzlement for the four 1-O leaders convicted of this crime has left a bitter taste in the mouths of Esquerra and Junts. And it is that this new judicial resolution has its derivative in the almost forty former senior officials of the governments of Artur Mas and Carles Puigdemont pending trial for this same crime. The most significant are the cases of the Republicans Josep Maria Jové and Lluís Salvadó, prosecuted by the Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) and considered architects of the 2017 referendum, but also those investigated by the 13th and 18th trial courts of Barcelona .
With the reform of the Criminal Code that was approved at the end of last year, Oriol Junqueras' main objective was for his subordinates –especially Jové and Salvadó, accused of embezzlement, prevarication, disclosure of secrets and disobedience– to avoid prison sentences, or at least unless they saw them attenuated. The Supreme Court's decision overthrows that claim.
In ERC they appreciate positive aspects, such as that sedition falls and the sentences of five of those convicted of the process are extinguished, but they see "arbitrariness" in the order of the High Court and denounce that it tries to leave this reform of the Penal Code "on paper" , that they “ignore it”, as the deputy general secretary, Marta Vilalta, assured this Monday at a press conference. In turn, President Pere Aragonès and Oriol Junqueras see a “will for revenge” in the Supreme Court.
The also ERC spokesperson has stated that “there is a long way to go”. She has repudiated a new reform of the Criminal Code – in the image and likeness of what is happening with the law of only yes is yes – that would leave the resolution in borage water. “The law is well done. (...) It is very clear ”, she underlined at the same time that she remarked that the modifications in the legal text have been effective “in part ”.
On behalf of Junts per Catalunya, the general secretary, Jordi Turull, has regretted that the 1-O referendum continues to be "criminalized" after the reform of the Penal Code, a dart directed both at the magistrates and the architects of the modification of the laws, the PSOE, Unidas Podemos and Esquerra. The pro-independence leader has also complained that the Supreme Court acts as "a legislator, a political opinion-maker and a vigilante", and has warned about the consequences that the interpretation of the Supreme Court may have for those who have not yet been tried.
Now, the convicted of JxCat and ERC intend to go before the European instances, although for this they will first present a motion for nullity before the Supreme Court itself – an action that will surely be rejected – to later appeal to the Constitutional Court.
It is in this amparo appeal for violation of rights that the Republicans have little hope. “There is margin”, they point out from Esquerra. The majority of this court is now progressive. Even its president, Cándido Conde-Pumpido. But he came to depart from the causes of the process after being challenged for alleged lack of impartiality by Carles Puigdemont.
In the PSOE, on the other hand, they assure that they have not been surprised by the Supreme Court's decision. According to socialist sources cited by Europa Press, when they approved the reform they thought that the disqualification sentence for Junqueras was going to remain as it was.
In this regard, the Deputy Secretary General of the PSOE and Minister of Finance and Public Function, María Jesús Montero, has affirmed that with the resolution known yesterday it is clear that the PP was lying "knowingly" when it affirmed that the penal reform promoted by the Government It was going to benefit the leaders of the procés.
