The General Council of the Judiciary has opened some informative proceedings regarding Judge Ricardo Fiestras, to clarify if there is reason to sanction his conduct in two incidents with the Civil Guard. The first occurred last February, when he was caught with about a dozen people in a chalet in the municipality of Yaiza, when the island was at alert level 4 and therefore violated the measures against Covid-19.
Initially, the CGPJ had indicated to La Voz that they did not plan to act ex officio, as they understood that the events affected his private life and not the exercise of his position as a judge. However, afterwards a complaint was received that led to opening these proceedings.
In addition, they later specify that “several” more complaints have been received, which have been added to the same file. The latest recounts another incident that would have taken place at the airport, with the agents of the Benemérita who are assigned to control that enclosure.
“As they are complaints that also deal with the chalet, they were accumulated to the initial one,” they have specified from the CGPJ to La Voz. However, they emphasize that at the moment it is only a “previous phase”, to determine what the facts were. When these proceedings conclude, it will be determined whether their filing or the initiation of disciplinary proceedings is appropriate.
Regarding who filed these complaints, the Council points out that all the latest ones are from “individuals”, although they have not clarified whether the Civil Guard itself also brought the facts to their attention.
In this regard, the spokesperson for the Unified Association of the Civil Guard in Las Palmas, Juan Couce, has stated on Radio Lanzarote - Onda Cero that after the intervention in the chalet in which Judge Fiestras was surprised, “the commanders requested the group agents who intervened to make a report to bring it to the attention of the CGPJ”. However, he specified that he does not know if they finally transferred that report to the Council, nor therefore if these proceedings were initiated as a result of it or by the intervention of other people.
In addition, Couce has questioned the file that has in turn been opened to two of the civil guards who intervened in the operation, after a complaint filed by the judge himself with the Civil Guard. In it, he questioned that the intervention had been recorded on video and that it had reached the media. In this regard, the AUGC spokesperson has defended the work of the agents and has highlighted the fact that they acted "the same" with a magistrate as with any other citizen. Regarding the file, he criticizes that even the facts that are imputed to them are not clear.
