He returns the case to the National Court and says that the competence falls on the Madrid judge who investigates the false testimony
MADRID, 19 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The Court of First Instance and Instruction Number 3 of Alcorcón has ruled out investigating whether the former Podemos adviser Dina Bousselham committed an alleged crime of false accusation when she expanded her complaint for the theft in 2015 of the mobile phone that hosted a series of information that was later published In the press. Thus, it has agreed to return the case to the National High Court, considering that the competence lies with the Madrid court that investigates the crime of perjury.
In this way, Judge Agustín Carretero has responded, in a car to which Europa Press has had access, to the magistrate in charge of the so-called ‘Villarejo case’, who last September requested that the courts of Madrid and Alcorcón investigate whether Bousselham had “lied” in his statements before the National High Court and if he had expanded his complaint with false information.
It should be remembered that Bousselham testified as a witness –for which she was obliged by law to tell the truth– in the framework of part 10 of the ‘Villarejo case’, where the route that her telephone card had since she received it is investigated. The mobile was stolen in 2015 until some of the information it contained was published in the media.
Judge Manuel García Castellón had asked Pablo Iglesias’ former adviser to be investigated because he believed that when she expanded her complaint in Alcorcón she knew that the files published in the press could have been previously disseminated by her to third parties. Thus, the head of the Central Court of Instruction Number 6 warned of an alleged “fraudulent procedural strategy, devised by the leadership of the Podemos organization and instrumentalized through legal services.”
The judge of Alcorcón –who by distribution had to study the request of the judge of the National High Court– has agreed to remand the case, concluding that if it is deduced that Bousselham lied in court and in police headquarters “following” a “strategy “what corresponds is that both things are investigated as a whole and not separately.
Thus, it has defended that, “consequently”, Bousselham’s actions must “be the subject of a single procedure that must be heard by the Madrid Investigating Court that corresponds in turn”, because said court is in charge of investigating the alleged crime of false testimony, which carries a penalty greater than the alleged crime of false accusation.
It was last September when the judge of the National High Court asked the courts of Madrid and Alcorcón to investigate Bousselham and his partner, Ricardo Sa Ferreira. He did so at the request of the Association of European Jurists ProLege –which exercises popular prosecution in the case– to determine if they had committed a crime of perjury –in their statements– or false accusation –in the enlargement of the complaint–.
The investigating magistrate believes that the former adviser of the ‘purple’ formation and her partner lied in their statements because on one occasion they said that when Iglesias returned the stolen mobile phone card it no longer worked; in the other, however, they stated that when it was delivered to them it only worked for the first time and then not.
Manuel García Castellón asked to investigate the actions of both witnesses against the criteria of the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, which indicated that although “vagueness and contradictions are evident” in the versions of Bousselham and Sa Ferreira, it could not be considered that this had altered in any way the result of the investigation.
The magistrate himself had highlighted the contradictions that he appreciated in the statements of Bousselham and Sa Ferreira in a reasoned statement that he submitted to the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court on October 7, 2020.
On that occasion, he requested that the former leader of Podemos Pablo Iglesias be investigated for alleged crimes of discovery and disclosure of secrets, aggravated by gender, computer damage and false accusation or complaint and / or simulation of the crime. The Supreme, however, dismissed the request.
Subsequently, the instructor put an end to the investigations of this separate piece of the ‘Villarejo case’ when he understood that it had reached a dead end because the experts of the Scientific Police could not determine how and when the damage had occurred in the mini SD.
However, the Criminal Chamber of the National High Court ordered this line of investigation to be reopened, at the request of Iglesias and Bousselham herself, to clarify whether the police leadership at the time was involved in any way in the theft of the telephone. The appellants alleged that it could be a kind of ‘Operation Kitchen’.
