Police have arrested the former deputy speaker of the Catalan Parliament, Josep Costa, and handed him over to the High Court of Catalonia (TSJC). Costa refused to go to testify on September 15th. The former deputy speaker tried to get the Spanish Constitutional Court to suspend the case so that it could be taken to the European Court of Human Rights. But the Spanish court did not resolve the interim measures that he requested and therefore the judicial wheels continued to turn against Costa, as part of the Parliamentary Bureau led by ex-speaker Roger Torrent which allowed two parliamentary debates on resolutions on the Spanish monarchy and Catalan self-determination in November 2019 despite warnings from the chamber’s lawyers that permitting the debates could violate the Constitutional Court’s ban.
Judge Maria Eugènia Alegret ordered the Mossos d'Esquadra to search for and arrest Costa in order to have him testify this Wednesday at noon. For that reason, the Catalan police arrested him. It is most likely that Costa will exercise his right not to testify and that Alegret will release him once he has appeared.
Costa, accused of disobedience, disobeyed again on September 15th and failed to appear before judge Maria Eugènia Alegret. He stated that he did not recognize the authority of the TSJC to judge any accord reached in the Catalan Parliament. "It makes no sense to dialogue with repressive judges and prosecutors, who do not understand basic concepts such as the separation of powers," he said in his tweet that day, stating that it was his intention to fight the accusation at European level with the action he has already opened and the related appeal for interim protection, lodged but not yet considered, in the Constitutional Court.
On September 20th, far-right Vox presented a request to the TSJC for the arrest of the former deputy speaker, for not appearing to testify. On September 15th, when Costa failed to appear, the judge Alegret had asked the parties if they requested any interim measures, but no one said anything - not even Vox, which is present in the case under a private prosecution, as is possible under Spanish law. But 24 hours later, this political party filed a motion for arrest of Costa for his "intentional absence." Alegret left the request unresolved. Two weeks days ago, the TSJC rejected giving another summons to Josep Costa.
Today, however, an arrest warrant reached the Mossos d'Esquadra who arrested Costa and transferred him directly to the High Court of Catalonia. In the judge's order, Alegret agrees to the arrest of Josep Costa since he did not appear on the day he was summoned to testify:
"Having verified in proceeding the personal summons made to the person investigated, and that person not having appeared, without having alleged any cause justifying his non-appearance from which it is deduced a non-disposition to appear before the judicial authority, of a voluntary nature, to which he has been, on the other hand, summonsed by the judge and where his appearance constituted an obligation imposed in art.775 of the Spanish law of criminal justice and a legal duty for the investigated according to the doctrine of the TC ".
Costa's European justice path
Josep Costa took the case to the Constitutional Court seeking its suspension in order open a European path, that is, presenting the case to the European Court of Human Rights.
According to the writ presented to the Constitutional Coust, to which ElNacional.cat has had access, it alleges an "unfounded criminal prosecution", "contamination and lack of impartiality" and violation of human rights, which is the aspect for which the European attention is sought. His lawyers, including Gonzalo Boye, are calling for the interim suspension of the case, which this Wednesday has had one of its key elements with the declaration of the defendants in order to be able to take the case to the European Court of Human Rights.