Remember that it is the same set in its day after the 2015 reform on crimes of terrorism
MADRID, 16 Feb. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The State Attorney General, Álvaro García Ortiz, defended this Thursday the criteria set by himself in a decree issued last November on how to apply the ‘law of only yes is yes’ in case reviews, stating that his indication of Maintaining the old penalties when they are taxable with the new norm is “the most guaranteeing and respectful” for the victims, while it has claimed that the role of jurists is not “purely arithmetic.”
“The function of the lawyer is not purely arithmetic, it is not -or should not be- an exercise in automatism, we are not mere calculators, we must be something more. Our job is to interpret the norm using all the legal tools, jurisprudence and hermeneutics at our disposal”, he said during his speech at the Senate Justice Commission to present the annual report of the State Attorney General’s Office (FGE).
Garía Ortiz has indicated that, “among the different constitutionally possible interpretations”, the Public Prosecutor’s Office has opted “for the one that guarantees the most guarantees and respects the rights of the victims and is most in keeping with the spirit of the international conventions signed by Spain, particularly with the Istanbul Convention”.
“I assure you that we have not invented anything”, he stressed to recall that “the same legal conclusion reached by the decree was, for example, the one sustained by our Supreme Court when applying the reform of the crimes of terrorism introduced by LO 2/2015 and that, like this one, lacked an expressly provided transitory regime”.
For this reason, it has reasoned that “the decree also intends to guarantee the principles of legal certainty and equality, ensuring that any prisoner, for whatever crime, is applied the same interpretation of the most favorable criminal law.”
“Sex offenders cannot have privileged treatment compared to other criminals who, throughout the different reforms of the Penal Code, have submitted their sentences for review,” he said.
García Ortiz has valued that the ‘law of only yes is yes’ “has brought about a paradigm shift by including affirmative consent as the axis and essential element of the crime, in line with the postulates of the Istanbul Convention, while incorporating preventive, protective and repair measures”.
In this sense, he stressed that “a victim who is assisted, protected, supported, empowered and with sufficient resources can face the harshness of the criminal process with better tools.”
And this, he has highlighted, “contains benefits not only for the victim himself, but also for the procedure, since it ensures proof of charge that is essential for the prosecution and punishment of the crime, avoiding spaces of impunity.”
“We are not alien to the political, social and media debate related to the punitive aspects of the law and the interpretation of the principle of retroactivity of the most favorable criminal law”, he wanted to emphasize.
