The Supreme applies amnesty: ends the case of eight separatists

MadridThe Supreme Court has applied the amnesty law to eight separatists —grouped into four cases— who were awaiting it. The decision comes a week after the ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union, a ruling that the high court tacitly decided to wait for. Formally, it had suspended the processing of the four cases following the question of unconstitutionality that it presented in July 2024. The Constitutional Court's ruling, which did not favor him, arrived in October 2025, but nine months have passed so that the Supreme Court has made a move. “The facts that gave rise to this procedure would offer no doubt as to their subsumption under Article 1 of the amnesty law. [...] The objective scope of application is therefore met,” conclude the four interlocutory decrees. They are three demonstrators convicted of aggravated public disorder in protests following the ruling in the Trial of the Process, a mayor which attributed to itself the powers of the schools to make the 1-O possible and the four members of the Parliament's Bureau - with Roger Torrent at the head - who were acquitted of having disobeyed the TC rulings.

It is not the first time the Supreme Court has applied the amnesty. The first to do so was Pablo Llarena on July 1, 2024. Although denied amnesty to Carles Puigdemont for the crime of embezzlement, he did admit that disobedience fell within the scope of the law and, therefore, he acquitted the former President of the Generalitat, as well as Toni Comín, Lluís Puig and Marta Rovira. “It is appropriate to declare that the scope of the law extends to actions and omissions susceptible of constituting the crime of disobedience,” he concluded. Now the resolutions are signed by Manuel Marchena, Carmen Lamela, Andrés Martínez Arrieta, Leopoldo Puente and Antonio del Moral.

Two protesters from Girona

The case of Abdessabour Al Youbi and Mohcine El Mesbay was what the Supreme Court used to torpedo the diligent application of the amnesty. Both were sentenced to one and a half years in prison for aggravated public disorder in the protests of October 2019 in Girona, after the sentence of the Procés trial. Al Youbi filed an appeal, and before resolving it, the high court sent the amnesty to the Constitutional Court for the first time in a ruling that described the Procés as a "coup d'état" on several occasions.

Specifically, they were convicted of having thrown stones at the headquarters of the Courts located on Avinguda Ramón Folch. The sentence states that they were part of a group of about 300 people who threw “all kinds of objects and, in particular, stones or pieces of pavement”. A stone injured a Mossos d'Esquadra officer, but it could not be proven who the perpetrator was.

A protester from Barcelona

The third is Oriol Calvo, a young man from the Poble-sec neighborhood, who was sentenced to a year and a half in prison for the post-sentence protests of 2019 in Barcelona. Initially, he was convicted of attacking authority and aggravated disorder, but the High Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) acquitted him of the first offense. The sentence, which is based solely on the testimony of two Mossos agents, detailed that he threw stones at the police line. His defense countered that he was in the "wrong place" at the "wrong time." He was one of the seven young people who were about to go to prison before the amnesty law.

Maties Serracant, former mayor of Sabadell

Maties Serracant (CUP) has also been exonerated, who was mayor of Sabadell from July 2017 to June 2019. Weeks before October 1st, he attributed to himself the powers regarding the authorization of the use of schools, as he was the one to give the green light for them to be used for the referendum: he was aware that this could generate responsibilities for the councilors in charge and wanted to exempt them. He was sentenced to a fine of 1,800 euros and four months of disqualification for a crime of disobedience.

The Board of the Parliament of Roger Torrent

Finally, the Supreme Court has also applied the amnesty to the pro-independence members of the Parliament's Bureau in the legislature after October 1: Roger Torrent, Josep Costa, Eusebi Campdepadrós, and Adriana Delgado. All four were acquitted in November 2022 because the TSJC considered that it was not proven that they "wished to disobey the mandates" of the Constitutional Court when they accepted the processing of resolutions on self-determination and against the monarchy.

Subsequently, the Prosecutor's Office appealed the acquittal to the Supreme Court. However, later, with the amnesty coming into force, the public ministry admitted that they should be pardoned. Despite this, Josep Costa objected, alleging that the acts are not a crime: he argued that criminal justice "radically lacks jurisdiction over the votes, opinions, or expressions of will of parliamentarians in the exercise of their functions".

An outstanding case: the Granollers Three

Despite the four new developments, three young people are still awaiting the Supreme Court's decision: the Tres de Granollers, who were convicted of attacking Mossos d'Esquadra officers on October 1, 2020, during the third anniversary of 1-O. They were among the first to be amnestied, but a police officer filed an appeal with the Supreme Court: it was the first amnesty that had been granted and that a Mossos officer tried to overturn.

They were sentenced to between three and three and a half years in prison and ordered to pay 76,000 euros in compensation for throwing stones at an anti-riot van during riots in the center of Barcelona. The officer who tried to overturn the amnesty is the one who suffered the injury, which the three independentists have always denied. He argued, precisely, that these injuries might not be included in the amnesty.

By the way, officers from the National Police and the Civil Guard also announced that they would do the same against the three young independentists who were convicted for the "Holi" protest against the JUSAPOL police union demonstration on September 29, 2018. However, they did not manage to formalize the appeal and, therefore, the amnesty became final.