José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero makes a move in the Plus Ultra case. The former President of the Government has asked the National High Court judge to declare the investigation null and void and to exclude all obtained evidence from the proceedings, as reported by El País.
The new filing elevates the defense strategy to a fundamental battle: it does not limit itself to denying the investigated facts, but questions the very validity of the material used to build the case.
The request comes amid a procedural offensive regarding the origin of several key pieces of evidence, including conversations incorporated into the case file and material seized in searches linked to other investigated individuals. The defense maintains that it must be clarified which judicial decisions authorized the analysis and reuse of these communications.
What Zapatero is asking the judge
Zapatero's defense requests that the Plus Ultra case be declared null and void and that all obtained evidence be excluded.
The legal key lies in whether certain pieces of evidence were incorporated into the proceedings with all the guarantees required by law. If the judge were to accept this thesis, the case could suffer a deep blow, as part of the indications supporting the charges would be excluded from the proceedings.
The focus is on the origin of some conversations and documents that appear in the case. The defense had already requested to know which judicial decision authorized the analysis of communications contained in a hard drive called "Crucial," seized from Miguel Palomero, a lawyer investigated in connection with the case.
This device allegedly contains chats that have been used to support police reports and to connect different parts of the investigation.
Zapatero's argument is that, if this material was obtained for a different procedure or purpose, its subsequent use in the Plus Ultra case required specific judicial authorization.
The "Crucial" hard drive
One of the most sensitive points is the "Crucial" hard drive, seized in searches conducted in October 2024 as part of international legal cooperation requests from France and Switzerland.
The defense wants to know if there was a judicial order that expressly authorized the Police or the Public Prosecutor's Office to analyze the private communications contained in this device.
The defense has also focused on the origin of chats linked to a mobile phone seized in the United States.
Judge Calama has already issued a letter rogatory to obtain information through judicial channels, but the defense considers that a broader clarification is needed to determine if those messages can be validly used in the proceedings.