The Constitutional Court will address the amparo appeals of Manuel Chaves and José Antonio Griñán for their conviction in the case of the fraudulent ERE just six days before the municipal and regional elections on May 28. The agenda of the Second Chamber of the High Court, to which this newsroom has had access, includes the deliberation on the admission for processing of the writings presented by the two former presidents of the Board at their meeting scheduled for May 22 at 10:00. In that session, the requests of the ex-counselors Antonio Fernández and Magdalena Álvarez will also enter.
The four appeals deal with the judgment of the Supreme Court that last September confirmed the theses of the Court of Seville. In November 2019, the Seville court sentenced the leadership of the socialist governments between 2000 and 2010 for their role in creating a fraudulent formula for the distribution of social and labor benefits. With this mechanism, the regional Administration under the control of the PSOE distributed 680 million euros, some of which went to intruders and people related to the socialists.
The situation of the four former leaders who will see their resources attended to on May 22 in the TC is very different. Manuel Chaves and Magdalena Álvarez are convicted of prevarication, so their convictions do not carry jail terms. Chaves, former president between 1991 and 2009, is sentenced to nine years of disqualification, the same as Álvarez, who was Minister of Economy and Finance until 2004 before entering the governments of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. For his part, the former Employment Minister Antonio Fernández, who is convicted of embezzlement and prevarication, is serving his sentence of seven years and 11 months (the longest of all those convicted) in the Puerto III prison, in Cádiz.
Griñán's situation
The situation of José Antonio Griñán is different. Like Fernández, he accumulates convictions for embezzlement and prevarication for his role in the stage as Manuel Chaves' Treasury adviser. The result is a six-year prison sentence, along with disqualification for another 15, but he is the only one of the convicted politicians whose sentence was confirmed by the Supreme Court who is not in prison.. The former president of the Board informed the Seville Court at the beginning of last December that he suffers from prostate cancer that began to be treated immediately. After the Institute of Legal Medicine (IML) analyzed the state of Griñán and the possible impact of his hospitalization for the treatment of his illness, the Court decided to paralyze the admission of the socialist politician to prison until the end of the radiotherapy sessions. that were prescribed.
The defense of the former leader of the Andalusian PSOE recently reported the end of this process and also explained to the Seville Court that the new one consists of rehabilitation and pharmacological treatment. At that point, the Seville court started the process again and has once again requested the IML of Seville to examine the former president of the Board. The objective is to determine if Griñán can continue his fight against cancer from prison and for this he will undergo an interview with forensic doctors on May 18, according to Efe on Thursday.. Then the doctors will issue a new medical report that should help the Seville Court decide on the admission of the former socialist leader to prison. If the deadlines match those of the first process, between last December and January, the photo of the former president of the Board entering prison could be given a few days before the polls.
The person in charge of presiding over the chamber that will deal with the admission for processing of the four appeals is Inmaculada Montalbán, vice-president of the TC and magistrate from Granada who joined the High Court in 2021. She did so at the proposal of the PSOE and came precisely from the Administrative Chamber of the High Court of Justice of Andalusia. It so happens that the jurist, an expert in gender issues, received the medal of Andalusia in 2012. She did so from the hands of Fuensanta Coves, who was then president of the regional Parliament, but under the mandate of José Antonio Griñán.