Marchena, Lamela and other familiar faces from the Process: the 1x1 of the judges who have convicted the Attorney General

BarcelonaTwo-year disqualification, fine, and compensation for Isabel Díaz Ayuso's partner. condemnation of the Attorney General of the StateÁlvaro García Ortiz arrived at the Supreme Court this Thursday, the 50th anniversary of Franco's death, unexpectedly. He arrived even earlier than anticipated, and in fact, the sentence had not yet been drafted. Who are the five judges of the criminal division who made this decision? And who are the two dissenting judges? We examine the profiles of a court with a conservative majority, and the names associated with the judicialization of the Process of National Reorganization abound.

Andrés Martínez Arrieta (Logroño, 1955), who at 43 became the youngest judge ever appointed to the Supreme Court, is now the most senior member of the Criminal Chamber. He has also served as its president since September, when he took over from Manuel Marchena. A founder of the moderate Francisco de Vitoria Association, he rose to the presidency of the Second Chamber with the support of the conservative wing of the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ). A member of the panel that presided over the October 1st trial, he was the presiding judge in the ruling that disqualified Baltasar Garzón for wiretapping defendants in the Gürtel corruption case while they were in prison, and also in the ruling that acquitted him for investigating crimes committed during the Franco regime. He will now be responsible for drafting the arguments for the Attorney General's conviction.

Remembered as the presiding judge of the court that convicted the leaders of the Catalan independence movement, Manuel Marchena (Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, 1959) is not affiliated with any judges' association but is considered among the conservative magistrates. A career prosecutor, he joined the Supreme Court in 2007 and served as president of the criminal division between 2014 and 2024. In 2018, he was slated to become the head of the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ), as agreed upon by the Socialist Party (PSOE) and the People's Party (PP), but he declined the appointment after rumors leaked that with Marchena in the position, they could control the Second Chamber "from behind the scenes." After leading the conviction of the political prisoners, he has also opposed the application of the amnesty from the Supreme Court.

Carmen Lamela (Madrid, 1961) joined the Supreme Court in 2018, but her name was already widely known. A year earlier, from the National Court, she had ordered the provisional imprisonment of Jordi Sànchez and Jordi Cuixart for the events of September 20th, as well as the nine members of the Catalan government who had not gone into exile during the October 1st referendum. As the investigating judge in the case against Josep Lluís Trapero, the former head of the Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police), she had previously handled the case of alleged terrorism against the young people from Altsasu, whom she prosecuted and imprisoned. She was also the judge who kept former FC Barcelona president Sandro Rosell in pretrial detention for almost two years on charges of alleged money laundering, before his eventual acquittal. Considered a conservative within the judiciary, she received the Police Merit Medal from the then-Minister of the Interior, Juan Ignacio Zoido, in October 2017.

Juan Ramón Berdugo (Valladolid, 1954), a member of the Supreme Court since 2004, is another of the judges who served on the panel for the October 1st trial. A member of the conservative Professional Association of Magistrates (APM), in 2020 he also drafted the ruling disqualifying Quim Torra for disobedience and, in 2024, the indictment of Carles Puigdemont and Ruben Wagensberg for terrorism in the Tsunami Democràtic case. He was part of the panel that in 2017 sentenced César Strawberry, lead singer of the band Def Con Dos, to prison for allegedly glorifying terrorism in tweets where he made ironic comments about topics such as ETA and the assassination of Carrero Blanco. The Constitutional Court overturned the sentence three years later for violating freedom of expression. Berdugo's record also includes drafting the opinion that upheld the PP's conviction in the Gürtel corruption case.

A member of the APM (Association of Magistrates of Murcia), with ultraconservative Catholic views and ties to Opus Dei, Antonio del Moral (Yecla, Murcia, 1959) is the judge who smiled during the trial of the former Spanish Prime Minister, a characteristic that did not go unnoticed on social media. With a previous career as a prosecutor, he joined the Supreme Court in 2012. The presiding judge in the 2018 ruling that sentenced Iñaki Urdangarin to prison in the Nóos case, he also drafted, two years earlier, the controversial decision that dismissed the case against the mayor of Jerez de la Frontera, María José García-Pela. The ruling's argument was that the PP (People's Party) deputy did not know what she was signing.

Ana Ferrer (Madrid, 1959) is one of the two judges who issued a dissenting opinion against the conviction of the Attorney General. A progressive and member of Judges for Democracy, she became the first woman to serve on the Criminal Chamber of the Supreme Court in 2014. Last year, she ran for the presidency of the chamber, a position held by Justice Martínez Arrieta, but withdrew her candidacy, and the conservative candidate prevailed. Her career highlights include leading the investigation against former Civil Guard Director Luis Roldán and serving as President of the Provincial Court of Madrid. A Supreme Court Justice since 2014, she was also on the panel that unanimously convicted the leaders of the Catalan independence movement in 2019. However, in her dissenting opinion, she opposed the Supreme Court's refusal to grant them amnesty.

Considered progressive and a member of Judges for Democracy, Susana Polo (1960) was the rapporteur for the order that opened the case against the Attorney General. She was also supposed to draft the judgment, but her disagreement with the sentence ultimately led to the task being passed on to Martínez Arrieta, the presiding judge of the chamber. She joined the Supreme Court in 2018, and this case is not her first notable dissenting opinion: she disagreed with the conviction of former Andalusian president José Antonio Griñán in the ERE case—also alongside Ana Ferrer—and opposed the conviction of former Podemos deputy Alberto Rodríguez. Polo, who described the October 1st ruling as "impeccable" and "brilliant" and endorsed the disqualification of Quim Torra, also presided over the Tsunami Democràtic case in the Supreme Court, which she herself would eventually dismiss.