Laura Borràs will avoid prison in exchange for a 25-hour course to prevent corruption

BarcelonaThe former president of the Parliament Laura Borràs will be able to avoid entering prison on the condition of taking a 25-hour course on corruption prevention in public administration. Borràs was initially sentenced to four and a half years in prison and a total disqualification of thirteen years for prevarication and document forgery for splitting contracts when she directed the Institution of Catalan Letters (ILC).

Following this conviction in March 2023, Borràs requested to avail herself of the amnesty law, but the Supreme Court rejected it arguing that this law was not applicable to corruption crimes that have no relation to the Process. After that, last July, Borràs received the partial pardon granted by the Spanish government, which reduced the prison sentence from four and a half years to two years. This partial pardon did not affect the thirteen years of disqualification, which remain in force.

Finally, now the High Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) has suspended her entry into prison on the condition that she does not commit any further crimes in the next five years and that she participates in a "training program on specific contents directly related to the ends that must guide the action of public administrations". These programs are part of the penal measures alternative to prison, and there are different types depending on the type of crime.

An "excessive" sentence for the judges

The TSJC convicted Borràs in March 2023 in a ruling in which the judges themselves assessed that the prison sentence they had to impose was "disproportionate and excessive." The Junts leader was convicted for favoring the businessman Isaías Herrero with split contracts, without following public procurement rules, which total more than 300,000 euros and were formalized between 2013 and 2018.

Herrero also sat in the dock, as did the businessman Andreu Pujol. Both benefited from a plea bargain with the Prosecutor's Office to obtain lower sentences as necessary collaborators, and their confessions, with which they incriminated Borràs, were taken into account as a mitigating factor.