The procedure was reopened last summer as a result of a complaint by the victims’ association Dignidad y Justicia against the ETA leadership for the crime of the young mayor
The former head of the terrorist group ETA Ignacio de Gracia Arregui, Iñaki de Renteriahas asked the National Court to file by prescription the case in which he is being investigated for the kidnapping and murder of the former PP councilor in Ermua (Vizcaya) Miguel Ángel Blanco 25 years ago.
Gracia Arregui has appealed before the Criminal Chamber of the National Court the order in which she became the fourth former leader of ETA against whom the procedure reopened last summer as a result of a complaint by the victims’ association Dignidad y Justice against the ETA leadership for the crime of the young mayor.
The judge investigating the case, Manuel García Castellón, at first declared the attack on Gracia Arregui time barred, although later, in response to an appeal from the Prosecutor’s Office, he agreed to also open a case against him, understanding that this is not the time for the proceedings. to decree the eventual prescription and that in any case it must be the Criminal Chamber that does it.
Gracia Arregui disagrees in her appeal, to which EFE has had access, in which she stresses that the 20 years provided for in the Penal Code have already elapsed for the prescription and argues that the Supreme Court establishes that this “can be proclaimed in any state of the procedure in which the concurrence of the requirements that define and condition it is clearly manifested”.
“If there is no possibility of demanding responsibility for a crime, as there is not in this case, It has no legal basis or support anyone to continue with a possible criminal proceeding against a person, in this case Gracia Arregui”, says the resource.
The defense of the former head of ETA also refers to a ruling by the Supreme Court, which indicated that “the right to the truth”, to “know the historical truth is not part of the criminal process and can only be satisfied tangentially”.
The possible prescription of the crimes in this case has been the subject of debate from the beginning and the judge already recognized in his last order the existing “legal controversy” and the “discrepancies” between the parties in relation to this matter. Dignity and Justice, for example, argues that the crimes are imprescriptible based on a European convention.
The case, where the judge investigates whether former members of the ETA leadership ordered or could have prevented the attack against Miguel Ángel Blanco, is also directed against Miguel Albisu Iriarte, Mikel Antza; his partner María Soledad Iparraguire, Anboto, and José Javier Arizcuren Ruiz, Kantauri.