Catalonia's Higher Public Prosecutor's Office has followed the order of the state's Attorney General, Álvaro García Ortiz, asking the Supreme Court of Catalonia (TSJC) to apply amnesty to the ERC parliamentarian and former right-hand man of Oriol. Junqueras, Josep Maria Jové and the president of the Port of Barcelona, Lluís Salvadó, are both accused of embezzlement and deception in the preparations for the 1-O referendum.
This is stated by the lieutenant prosecutor of the Catalan Higher Public Prosecutor's Office, Pedro Ariche demanded seven years in prison for Jové– in a letter addressed to the TSJC confirming that the request for amnesty to Jové, Salvadó and the acting Minister of Culture, Natàlia Garriga – accused solely of disobedience – responds to the Attorney General's order.
The Lieutenant Prosecutor states that he is requesting amnesty for Jové and Salvadó “in strict application of the instrumental principles of unity of action and hierarchical dependence” by which the Public Prosecutor's Office operates and “with the understanding” that both principles are “subordinate to the superior values of respect for legality and impartiality, which constitute the essential core of the constitutional function of this Office and which govern its actions before the courts.”
Although he suggests that he does not agree with the amnesty, the lieutenant prosecutor continues to request it without creating a conflict like the one launched by the four prosecutors of the trial against the Attorney General and which ended with a victory for García Ortiz in favor of applying the amnesty law of criminal oblivion of the trial in all cases. He also did not include political commentary in his writing, as the four Supreme Court prosecutors did.
Lieutenant Prosecutor Ariche explains that he cannot approach the amnesty request “from a purely individualistic perspective”, but that his position must be “subject” to the case of the Supreme Court trial, as the conduct and costs involved in the case would be convicted Barcelona is very similar to that of the trial process. And if the Public Prosecution Service asks for amnesty for the first, it should also do so for the second.
The prosecutor calls for a “comprehensive response” from the Public Prosecution Service to all cases investigating the preparations for the 2017 elections and “guaranteeing the instrumental principle of unity of action, which in turn guarantees legal certainty.” In this way, the prosecutors will also demand amnesty for the thirty persons under investigation who are not certified and are waiting for the Barcelona court to decide on their amnesty for the same facts.
García Ortiz, who as Attorney General determines the position of the rest of the members of the Public Prosecutor's Office, ordered that “all” conduct in preparation for the 1-O referendum should be declared amnesty, including those that constitute a crime of embezzlement could entail.
The Attorney General used a series of legal arguments to refute the positions of the four prosecutors of the trial, who demanded that the crime of embezzlement be excluded from the law, as the costs of financing the consultation “enriched” the defendants had served. .