Romina's case is stopped while the secretary of the Chamber is on strike

The last procedure necessary to bring to trial the death of Romina Celeste Núñez, the young woman allegedly murdered by her husband in Lanzarote on January 1, 2019, will not be able to be resolved while the secretary of the Criminal Chamber of the Superior Court of Justice of the Canary Islands remains on strike.

This is what the Criminal Chamber itself explains in a press release in which it reports on how the indefinite strike called among the group of lawyers of the Administration of Justice is affecting, to which its titular lawyer has joined.

A few weeks ago, the alleged murderer of the young Paraguayan woman, her husband Raúl D.C., was released after having already served four years in pre-trial detention (the legal maximum) without the procedure to bring the facts before a Jury having been completed.

In its note, the Criminal Chamber of the TSJC confirms that the necessary steps to be able to judge the case are pending a response to the appeals presented by the parties against the order of the Las Palmas Court that resolved the preliminary issues.

The Chamber convened the necessary hearing to hear the opinion of the prosecution and the defense regarding the preliminary issues for January 31, despite the strike of lawyers of the Administration of Justice, because the holder of that position had informed that she was going to take a leave for personal matters until February 7 and her substitute did not plan to support the labor protest.

However, the Chamber continues, three days before the hearing was held, the lawyer of the Administration of Justice, Isabel Morales, warned by a whatsapp message that, for personal reasons, she desisted from taking those days off and warned that, therefore, on January 31 she was going to be on strike (which legally could not be replaced, because it is not a case with a prisoner subject to minimum services).

To this was added that the lawyer designated for the minimum services of that day alerted the court that he was not going to attend the hearing nor did he assume the commitment to guarantee "the authenticity and integrity" of the recording of that act, "with all the damages" that this could entail for the parties (attesting to the veracity of what is collected in the minutes and recordings is one of the competences of the judicial secretaries).

Upon arrival on January 31, the president of the court designated to resolve the issues, Antonio Doreste, informed the prosecution and defense that the secretary of the Chamber was on strike and that the hearing was not included in the minimum services, but all parties agreed to hold it and pledged not to challenge it.

The Chamber points out that the hearing was recorded in the official video system, but the next day they learned that one of the accusations could not download the images and that the parties were asking if this was due to a computer problem or the strike.

"Consequently, and as long as the strike of the lawyer of the Administration of Justice of the Chamber persists, the case is paralyzed, preventing the processing by the Provincial Court from continuing" in order to bring it to trial, the note concludes.