Judge Juan Carlos Peinado communicated this week to Begoña Gómez who, if he finally sits on the bench for the crime of embezzlement attributed to him for the tasks his assistant, will be a popular jury who determines whether or not he is guilty. The parties can request that the procedure be modified if they consider that the crimes are not the jury's competence, but, if everything goes ahead, it will be nine citizens, elected by raffle, those in charge of deciding whether the accusations or the defenses are created.
In Spain, the composition of the nine members and two substitutes of the jury is decided among the residents of the same municipality, within the province in which the crime has been committed, According to the law of the jury courtdating from 1995. They have to be Spanish and of legal age, know how to read and write, be able to exercise their political rights and not have a psychic or physical disability that prevents the performance of their functions.
Foot citizens can only prosecute crimes against people, those committed by public officials in the exercise of their positions, against honor and against freedom and security. Among these crimes is the embezzlement of public flows, although there are few cases of this criminal type that prosecute. Last year, for example, only one of the 48 trials with jury at the Madrid Court referred to embezzlement, as indicated to Efe Legal sources.
The majority of the sentences issued by a popular jury are condemnatory. According to the Latest data from the General Council of the Judiciarydating from 2016, 92.3% of the total (193 of 209) were condemnatory.
How is the jury formed?
The list of jury candidates – which may be called or not – is done every two years by draw within the electoral census. There are several impediments: being prosecuted, complying with a crime of malicious or being suspended from public office, among others. Nor can deputies and senators, the royal family or active members of the judicial and fiscal career be part of a popular jury; as well as people who have family ties, friendship or direct or indirect interest in the cause.
Every time there is a cause, a month in advance of the first view of the trial, a raffle is made among the jury candidates of the list to choose 36 candidates. There is a period of excuses in which candidates can expose their reasons not to participate in a questionnaire. The Prosecutor's Office and the other parties, to whom the questionnaire that the candidates for jurors have answered have been previously delivered, may formulate challenge by attending lack of requirements or any of the causes of disability or incompatibility. And after this, if there are still at least 20 citizens, another raffle will be carried out to select the nine jurors that will be part of the court, and two more as substitutes.
Can you challenge the chosen members?
Yes. The parties, after formulating the questions they want (and that the magistrate presided by the court declares relevant) may challenge without claiming any certain reason up to four by the accusations and another four by the defenses, according to the law.
What happens during the trial?
Jury members have the right to absent work justified and the law contemplates a remuneration for every day the 67 euros trialin addition to compensation for travel expenses by private vehicle, accommodation and maintenance expenses in case of being necessary.
Citizens have to rule on the facts, but never carry out legal qualifications. During the development of the trial, the court can ask questions to witnesses, accused and experts. The judge is in charge of deciding whether the issues are appropriate or not, as in any other process.
In the end, the President of the Court has to give them a sheet with the specific facts so that they declare whether they have been tested or not proven, and must issue a verdict of guilt or innocence. For the guilt, seven votes are needed, while for innocence there are five. It is the magistrate who must give legal form to the verdict and abide by it, unless contradictions occur in proven facts or there are defects in the vote.
During deliberation, the nine citizens remain incommunicado with the outside. In this way it is intended to avoid the influence that the media information can have or even that the realization of calls related to the case, for example.
That does not mean that, in cases like this, citizens already know how the procedure has elapsed: the hairstyle has been investigating Begoña Gómez for more than a year. Several socialist leaders have questioned that this trial can be made with popular jury: “I get the impression that the figure of the popular court is intended in our procedure for other cases,” he said, for example, Page.
The cause of Francisco Camps's costumes is another of the examples of judgment with great media relevance: in 2012, the jury declared him and the former regional director of the PP Ricardo Costa “not guilty” by five votes to four of a crime of improper passive bribery when he did not consider that the Gürtel plot would have given him some milano costumes. A PP militant who had been present in all sessions of the trial, Carlos Lirio, It was photographed on the terrace of the hotel where the jury was housed. The Supreme Court confirmed the decision a year later.