The Supreme Court has sentenced the State Attorney General, Álvaro García Ortiz, to a two-year ban from office for the “crime of revealing confidential data”, according to the sentence announced Thursday after only a week of deliberation. The sentence is awaiting drafting, so the Attorney General is, on the one hand, forced to leave his post, and on the other, without the possibility of publicly responding to a resolution whose arguments he does not know, while those who attacked him celebrate the sentence as a political victory. The sentence does not take effect until it is notified.
The prosecutor was initially denounced for having published a press release in which he detailed the sequence of emails between the lawyer of Alberto González Amador, Isabel Díaz Ayuso’s partner, and the Prosecutor’s Office regarding a possible agreement for alleged tax fraud. With this note, García Ortiz wanted to defend the Public Prosecutor from a hoax spread by Miguel Ángel Rodríguez, chief of staff of the Madrid president, about how those negotiations began and how they were structured.
At the beginning of this proceeding, the Supreme Court itself ruled that the contents of the email note were not secret, as they had previously been published by the press. The statement then led to the original leak of the published information. Neither the investigation nor the oral trial provided conclusive evidence that García Ortiz was the one who leaked the news. The journalists in possession of the information, and he himself, expressly denied that he was the source. The responsibility of García Ortiz was highlighted indicatively by the Guardia Civil and by some witnesses.
The sentence announces that García Ortiz committed the crime of revealing confidential information, but until the sentence is published it is not known what information, or how, was revealed, nor why he is the guilty one. This increases doubts, but, for the same reason, it is essential to urge prudence and respect while the arguments of the Supreme Court, the sequence of established facts and their criminal suitability are not known. The Government said it respected but did not agree with the ruling. The PP called for early elections.
Unfortunately, the Court was unable to find consensus among the seven justices, including five conservatives and two progressives. The two judges considered progressive, Ana Ferrer and Susana Polo, announced private votes. The division and sense of haste do a disservice to the image of the judiciary. This case had an obvious political root from its origin, since it was brought by the Community of Madrid against a high judicial office assumed as if he were a member of the government. A unanimous ruling, of unquestionable clarity understandable to citizens, could have contributed to attenuating the generalized feeling of politicization of justice. The case will continue before the Constitutional Court if, as can be expected, García Ortiz appeals for protection.
The criminal conviction against a sitting State Attorney General constitutes an unprecedented institutional shock in Spain. It is possible that the resignation (to avoid institutional tensions, not as an acknowledgment of guilt) would have tempered this storm, but in any case those who celebrate a political victory today must think about the price that the institutions will pay. The precedents created by this case, from the lack of prosecution evidence to a more than dubious investigation, will influence the entire Spanish justice system for a long time.
