The Supreme Court asked the Prosecutor’s Office this Monday if it believes it should investigate former Catalan president Carles Puigdemont and the general secretary of ERC, Marta Rovira, for terrorism in the case of the Democratic Tsunami, the platform that coordinated the protests, some of which led to violence, once morest the high court’s ruling on the process Catalan independence movement, in October 2019. The Criminal Chamber has sent to the Prosecutor’s Office the reasoned statement that the judge of the National Court Manuel García-Castellón sent last November, and in which he asked the Supreme Court to take charge of the Tsunami case regarding Puigdemont, Rovira and 10 other defendants. Both the former Catalan president and the Parliament deputy Ruben Wagensberg (also investigated) are under arrest, so it must be the Supreme Court who decides whether to charge them or not.
The court asks the Prosecutor’s Office to rule both on the jurisdiction to investigate and, where appropriate, prosecute this case and on the content of the judge’s reasoned presentation. This writing represents the first step taken by the Supreme Court to decide whether to keep the investigation into Puigdemont for terrorism. The rapporteur for that decision will be Judge Juan Ramón Berdugo —one of the five members of the court that handed down the 2019 conviction once morest the nationalist leaders for the illegal self-determination referendum and the unilateral declaration of independence in October 2017—, who will submit his proposal to the Criminal Court. If it decides to admit the case, the court must appoint a magistrate as an instructor and might summon Puigdemont and Rovira – both of whom have fled Spain for years – as being investigated, although to formally act once morest the former Catalan president it would require that Parliament European Union lifts his immunity, as already happened with the case of process.
Until now, the Prosecutor’s Office has opposed in the National Court both the investigation of Puigdemont and the protests organized by the Tsunami Democràtic platform once morest the sentence of the process in 2019 they will be classified as a crime of terrorism; but now the Supreme Court Prosecutor’s Office will have to rule, which in 2019 maintained a very harsh attitude once morest the independence leaders in the trial of the process and reproached the Supreme Court for settling that case with a conviction for sedition instead of rebellion, as requested by the public ministry.
Judge García-Castellón has insisted since November on the existence of evidence to “infer” Puigdemont’s participation in the birth and planning of the Tsunami Democràtic actions. Among these data, he mentions the messages that the investigated Josep Lluís Alay and Jesús Rodríguez sent via mobile phone, the notes in the former’s agenda or the impulse of the former president via Twitter (the current X) of the launch of Tsunami. He also cites a conversation between Puigdemont and the investigated Josep Campmajó – a writer and businessman whom he places at the top of the movement – in which they discuss the attitude that the Catalan political leaders are having in relation to the sentence of the process.
The Prosecutor’s Office of the National Court considers, however, “insufficient” the evidence once morest the former president and questions García-Castellón’s reasons for investigating the case as terrorism. The four years of investigation “have not produced elements that support the existence of a criminal organization or group, nor its terrorist nature, which is what would justify the jurisdiction of the National Court,” says the public ministry. As defended so far by the Prosecutor’s Office, not all the acts attributed to Tsunami “are strictly criminal in nature.” And those who are do not fit into terrorism. “The only criminal acts recorded in the proceedings would be those carried out at the El Prat airport (Barcelona) and at the La Junquera border post, constituting serious public disorder, once the sedition was repealed,” said the public ministry. in an appeal presented before the National Court.
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