The brewer whom Marchena has condemned for insulting the king

BarcelonaOn Tuesday, the Supreme Court upheld the €720 fine for minor insults to the crown imposed by the National Court in 2022 on Albert Baiges (Montbrió del Camp, 1984) for insulting Felipe VI on social media and urging him to "cut his throat." Manuel Marchena was the author of a ruling that rejects the defendant's right to freedom of expression. The judge who sentenced the leaders of the 1-O movement and the other magistrates consider the insults not protected by the doctrine of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) and that they contribute nothing to the "political debate on the monarchy as a form of state."

Baiges is considering filing an appeal for protection in the Constitutional Court (TC) or going to Europe. "This ruling was already written, and we'll go wherever necessary because it's always the same people doing the same things against the same people," she says, referring to Marchena, whom she calls "the spearhead of Spanish nationalism." The activist jokes that the Prosecutor's Office accused her of having the power to influence others to carry out her call. "I had 160 followers on Twitter, so I had little power," the activist quips, attributing the legal proceedings to her long activism in the pro-independence left, first in the SEPC and then in Endavant and the CDR.

It's a case that could have ended much worse. Following her tweet, the National Police's Information Brigade accused her of glorifying terrorism for reposting a message commemorating the deaths suffered by ETA or for making statements against the police. "They even gave it a name, Operation Krona, it's grotesque," denounces Baiges, who recalls the incongruity that photos of the king can be burned, but not insultedIn fact, Alerta Solidaria, which defended him, recalled that on Thursday, it was exactly seven years since the ECHR ordered the State to annul the fine imposed on two separatists for burning photos of the king.

The National Police requested the wiretapping of communications and even an arrest, but the National Court judge, Maria Tardón, put the brakes on the police force and suspended the proceedings against this brewer, who works for a cooperative in Baix Camp. She did so late, though. "I spent a year and a half dragging out a crime for which they were seeking eight years in prison for Pablo Hasél or Valtónic, with the anguish that this entailed, and when I asked for an explanation for the delay, they told me it had been extended due to a computer error."