The TC is preparing to admit the resources of Chaves and Griñán for the ERE case in the middle of the electoral campaign
The Second Chamber of the Constitutional Court is preparing to admit on the 22nd the amparo claims filed by the former Andalusian presidents Manuel Chaves and José Antonio Griñán, against the sentences imposed by the Supreme Court for the fraud of the ERE in Andalusia.
According to legal sources reported to EL MUNDO, the Chamber chaired by Vice President Inmaculada Montalbán has indicated for the same week of the municipal and regional elections of 28-M the decision to admit (or not admit) the resources of Chaves, Griñán, the former minister socialist Magdalena Álvarez and the former Deputy Minister of Employment of the Junta de Andalucía Antonio Fernández García.
With this indication, the High Court disregards the unwritten rule to avoid making any pronouncement on matters of special political importance on dates close to the electoral procedures. Although it is true that in the case of admitting the resources it does not imply a decision on the merits of the same, it is also true that only a small percentage of the amparo claims presented before the TC are admitted for processing.
For their part, sources from the court of guarantees consider it highly probable that the appeals will be admitted for processing, although they believe there will be no unanimity within the Chamber on the decision.. The head issue corresponds to the progressive vice president Montalbán on the lawsuit filed last November by the former Andalusian counselor and former minister of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, Magdalena Álvarez. At first, the decision on admissions was going to be studied in Section -a body made up of three magistrates- but the member of the conservative sector César Tolosa maintained that the aforementioned deliberation should be referred to the Chamber and it was done.
The Supreme Court sentenced the former president of the Junta José Antonio Griñán to six years in prison for a crime of prevarication and another of embezzlement of public funds, as well as the disqualification from public office for nine years for the former socialist president Manuel Chaves for prevarication.
The Criminal Chamber maintained that both former presidents were aware of and consented to the “absolute lack of control” of the ERE fraud through which 700 million euros were diverted from public coffers for a decade.
Despite the fact that the sentence was imposed in the summer of 2022, former president Griñán is still pending prison due to the serious illness he currently suffers. Two weeks ago, the Provincial Court of Seville requested another medical report on his state of health to make a new assessment of whether he should go to prison to serve the six years in prison to which he was sentenced for corruption.