A new retirement in the Supreme Court exacerbates the crisis in the court due to the impossibility of new appointments

The High Court already has 18 vacancies, which represent 14% of its staff

MADRID, 27 Dic. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The retirement of Octavio Herrero, contentious-administrative magistrate of the Supreme Court (TS), exacerbates the crisis in the High Court due to the impossibility of the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) to make discretionary appointments in the judicial leadership while it continues in office .

This Tuesday, the Official State Gazette (BOE) publishes the agreement of the Permanent Commission of the CGPJ declaring the forced retirement of magistrate Octavio Herrero for reaching the legally established age on December 27.

Legal sources indicate to Europa Press that with the departure of Herrero, the Contentious-Administrative Chamber continues to decline, which already has a deficit of 10 magistrates; that is to say, that at present it is integrated by 23 magistrates instead of the 33 that it should have --32 plus the president--.

Looking ahead to next year, the situation in this Chamber could worsen, since Inés Huerta will also retire on March 27. And that without taking into account that several of its members sound like possible candidates for the Constitutional Court (TC) by the CGPJ, which must name two.

It should be remembered that the Contentious-Administrative Chamber, together with the Social Chamber, is the one that has been most affected by the law approved in March 2021 that prohibits the CGPJ from making discretionary appointments while it is in office --as it has been since December 2018 due to the inability of the parliamentary groups to reach an agreement to renew the governing body of the judges and elect the 20 members that correspond to them--.

In addition, both chambers are the ones that accumulate the majority of the claims made before the Supreme Court due to the effects of the pandemic, from labor to administrative claims. The sources point out that this has caused an increase in the cases to be resolved just when there are fewer magistrates, which has resulted in a significant traffic jam at both venues.

According to CGPJ sources consulted by Europa Press, the total number of vacancies in the judicial leadership now reaches 70: 18 of them in the Supreme Court, 32 in the Superior Courts of Justice, 20 in the Provincial Courts and 1 in the National Court.

A year ago, in October 2021, the Governing Chamber of the Supreme Court approved a report from the Technical Cabinet warning that failure to fill the current vacancies in the High Court would imply that 1,000 fewer sentences would be carried out per year.

The document reviewed the impact of the impossibility of filling vacancies in each of the five courtrooms. Except in the Criminal Chamber -which was not affected by the lack of filling vacancies in the immediate future- in the rest of the chambers the situation is defined as very worrisome if the vacancies are not filled urgently.

The Contentious-Administrative Chamber is the most affected by vacancies. It is followed by the Social Chamber, which should have 13 magistrates, including the president. However, there are five vacancies, including that of its last president, María Luisa Segoviano, who retired on October 20. On July 18, Rosa María Virolés will also do so.

Equally critical is the situation of the Military Chamber, where of the 8 magistrates that usually make it up, 6 remain, to which Fernando Pignatelli will join on September 7.

The problem that the Social and Contentious-Administrative Chambers have been facing for some time is that their magistrates must rotate to be able to compose the sections where matters are deliberated and ruled on, a kind of small courts that must have five magistrates.

More comfortable is the situation of the Civil Chamber, where there is only one vacancy, which means that it still retains 9 of its ten magistrates. For now, the only one intact is the Criminal Chamber, which maintains its 15 magistrates. He will suffer his first loss on April 13 due to the retirement of Miguel Colmenero.

Given this situation, in the Supreme Court they remain waiting for two things: an agreement between the Government and the PP to renew the CGPJ, so that the dynamics of discretionary appointments can be recovered; or that the Constitutional Court rule on whether or not the aforementioned reform of the Organic Law of the Judiciary (LOPJ) is constitutional.