The magistrate of the National Court (AN) who is handling the so-called 'Leire Díez case', Santiago Pedraz, has given the green light for the Independent Judicial Forum (FJI) to join the proceedings, the professional association to which the judge from Badajoz Beatriz Biedma belongs, who carried out the investigation into David Sánchez, the brother of the Prime Minister, Pedro Sánchez.
Legal sources consulted by Europa Press indicate that the judge ordered this Thursday, by means of a ruling, allowing his intervention as an accusation in the procedure in which a supposed plot is being analyzed aimed at stopping or distorting judicial cases that affect the Executive and the PSOE, a structure that would have been headed by the former socialist leader Santos Cerdán and coordinated by the former party member Leire Díez.
However, those same sources specify that the investigating judge rejected that the FJI do so as a separate accusation. Thus, the association will be incorporated into the unified popular accusation led by the PP once it deposits the 10,000-euro bail. Pedraz also denied the Foro's request to be exempt from paying that bond, they add.
From the association, they criticize these decisions, understanding that they are being added to a popular accusation of a "very political" profile, something that, in their view, departs from their specific objective in this procedure, which is "to act as a professional association in defense of its associate and of the entire judicial career".
FJI will appeal and demands an accusation outside parties
For this reason, they advance to this agency that they will challenge both rulings, focusing on the one that denies them the possibility of acting as an accusation in a separate manner, considering that FJI "must exercise the popular accusation free from any image of affinity with political parties, whatever their political stance. Otherwise, they could stop being part of the case, although they hope they will not have to reach such a situation, they indicate.
It is worth remembering that Biedma is appearing as an injured party, after requesting it by reporting that she had been the subject of "actions aimed at obtaining information about her person, discrediting her publicly and professionally, promoting complaints and grievances against her, gathering information about her surroundings and removing her from specific judicial proceedings", in addition to attributing to former judge Luis Sáenz de Tejada --accused in the case-- that he put "her physical integrity" at risk.
In this context, FJI issued a statement in which it censured the "indolence" of the General Council of the Judiciary for not unanimously reproving, by all of its members, the reported facts: "If there is evidence of a situation of suffering and distress suffered by a judge simply because she has carried out her work," the governing body of judges "would have to show unwavering support, regardless of whether the persons investigated are innocent or guilty of such facts."
The assembly of Foro Judicial Independiente, at the end of its XXII Congress held last week, ratified "its support and solidarity for its colleague Beatriz Biedma, in the face of acts of pressure and persecution" and confirmed "to provide guidance and legal assistance to its member and the association's decision to appear in the case as a popular prosecution."