The President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, has intensified his legal strategy against Judge Juan Carlos Peinado. This Thursday, the State Attorney General’s Office, representing the president, has requested the extension of the complaint for judicial prevarication that it already filed at the end of July against the magistrate, according to the newspaper The CountryThe document, submitted to the Civil and Criminal Division of the High Court of Justice of Madrid, maintains that Peinado commits an “intrinsic injustice” and makes “forced or artificial interpretations” of the current doctrine.
Peinado is investigating the case against Sánchez’s wife, Begoña Gómez, for alleged crimes of influence peddling and corruption in business. The conflict dates back to July 30, when Judge Peinado went to La Moncloa with the intention of questioning Sánchez in his capacity as Gómez’s husband. The president’s statement lasted barely two minutes. This appearance, which according to the law should have been made in writing, generated an initial complaint against the judge that the State Attorney General’s Office filed before the High Court of Justice of Madrid, considering that his summons had been “unfair” and made “knowingly.”
Now, the extension of the complaint arises after the order issued by Judge Peinado on August 22, in which it is suggested that “conclusions” can be drawn from the “silence” of Sánchez, who invoked his right not to testify as a witness due to his link with the person under investigation, according to the document to which EL PAÍS has had access. The State Attorney’s Office interprets this statement as an attempt to give undue publicity to the process, far removed from the purpose of the judicial investigation. According to the document presented, the magistrate would be improperly using a procedural right of the witnesses, turning it into an “unfounded source of inferences with procedural effects.”
The Public Prosecutor’s Office has questioned Judge Peinado’s actions on several occasions, pointing out that the investigation lacks “sufficient evidence” and that the resolutions issued respond more to personal convictions than to an objective exercise of his judicial function. The magistrate ordered the delivery of a copy of the recording of Sánchez’s statement to the defendants in the case, which include Vox and the far-right pseudo-union Manos Limpias – who initiated the case against Gómez. He did so with a criterion contrary to that of the Public Prosecutor’s Office, which considered that the dissemination of this recording could lead to inappropriate leaks and that it should not have occurred.
The State Attorney’s Office has expressed concern about the “continuous leaks” in the case and has accused the judge of not taking adequate measures to prevent the undue disclosure of information, pointing out that Peinado acts with “awareness” of the leaks but without exercising the relevant disciplinary powers.
In addition to Sánchez’s complaint, Begoña Gómez also filed a complaint against Judge Peinado for prevarication, alleging that he has made “arbitrary and manifestly unfair” decisions and has bent the rules in a “perverse” investigation. Gómez’s lawyer, former minister Antonio Camacho, has requested that the judge be investigated for alleged crimes of prevarication, disclosure of procedural actions declared secret and disclosure of secrets by a public official.
The Madrid Provincial Court is scheduled to deliberate and vote on September 30 on whether to allow Judge Peinado to continue with the investigation into the Begoña Gómez case, as requested by both Gómez’s defense and the Prosecutor’s Office. According to the resolutions issued so far, the investigation focuses on the links between the president’s wife and the Complutense University of Madrid, her relationship with the businessman Juan Carlos Barrabés, and her connection with Javier Hidalgo, former CEO of Globalia, the group that owns Air Europa, rescued by the Government during the pandemic, a practice that was also carried out by other EU countries.
Sánchez has publicly defended the complaint for malfeasance of office against Peinado, describing the judge’s attempt to question him in La Moncloa as a “set-up” and describing the spectacle staged by the far-right associations trying to gain access to the Palace as “pathetic and shameful.” The President of the Government has insisted that the judge’s actions have violated rights recognised to the institution of the Presidency of the Government since 1886, and has reiterated his willingness to defend the legality of the position.
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