The British justice admits the immunity of King Juan Carlos in Corinna's lawsuit

Corinna has lost the first battle of the war that she has raised against King Juan Carlos.

Thomas Osborne
Thomas Osborne
06 December 2022 Tuesday 06:34
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The British justice admits the immunity of King Juan Carlos in Corinna's lawsuit

Corinna has lost the first battle of the war that she has raised against King Juan Carlos. This Tuesday, the Court of Appeals for England and Wales has admitted the defense arguments of the former head of state by granting him immunity for the acts committed up to the time of his abdication on June 18, 2014, including the episodes of alleged harassment and threats that Corinna Larsen attributes to him in the lawsuit that he has filed in the London Court. King Juan Carlos, who lives in Abu Dhabi, has prudently received the court ruling, according to sources close to him, while Corinna Larsen's lawyers consider that their client can still continue with the lawsuit for the events that took place after the abdication.

One month after the hearing in which King Juan Carlos's lawyers presented their arguments, the Court of Appeal, to which they appealed after the refusal of the judge handling the case to accept the immunity of the emeritus, has recognized that the British Justice it does not have the power to judge who was Head of State. At that hearing, the appeal judge listened in one breath to the defense of King Juan Carlos, while he interrupted and questioned the arguments of Corinna Larsen's team of lawyers.

In the resolution made public this Tuesday, the court recognizes the appeal filed by the emeritus to justify that his actions between April 2012 and June 18, 2014 did not belong to his private sphere, so it is appropriate to grant him immunity in that period. , although the trial against him could be carried out for his actions after his abdication. The decision, made public this Tuesday, amends the opinion of the High Court of London, which last March ruled that Juan Carlos I did not have immunity between 2012 and 2020, the period that Corinna accuses him of having harassed her personally or through people of your environment.

The point is that most of the facts that appear in Corinna's lawsuit date from mid-2012 to 2014, with those attributed to her after her abdication being minor and without supporting documents.

The arguments of the lawsuit have been explained in recent weeks in the podcast "Corinna and the King", in which the German businesswoman has recounted with specific dates the alleged episodes of harassment and threats that took place after the accident in Botswana, for part, according to the applicant, of the Spanish secret services and, more specifically, of the then direct of the CNI, Félix Sanz Roldán. The podcast, designed to bolster the lawsuit, can now be used against Corinna's arguments.

Despite the fact that the trial will take place, presumably in the middle of next year, the ruling of the Court of Appeals will leave out of the process some of the actions that are most damaging to the cause of the emeritus, especially those related to the alleged harassment maneuvers. and espionage led by the then head of the National Intelligence Center (CNI), Félix Sanz Roldán. The judicial ruling interprets that the actions of the former director of the CNI were carried out "under the direction or with the consent" of the emeritus, but the court considers that "whatever his supposed private or inappropriate motivation was", these facts "were subject to the sovereign immunity

The decision of the Court of Appeal is based decisively on the sentence on the former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet, when it was stipulated that "immunity is that of the State, and therefore it can only be suppressed by the State itself".

Corinna Larsen's defense has issued a statement on Tuesday in which it considers that the immunity granted to the emeritus king by the London Court of Appeal for his actions until his abdication, in 2014, only "affects a very limited matter". Michael Kim, from the Kobre law firm

According to sources familiar with the case, Corinna's final objective is to use the lawsuit to reach an agreement with King Juan Carlos that guarantees her ownership of the 65 million euros that she received as an irrevocable gift at the time. According to Spanish legislation, the heirs of King Juan Carlos could claim that money from him on the day, considering that this donation in her lifetime is part of King Juan's estate. ,