Why did the interpreters of the Roger Español case trial not know how to translate Catalan?

BarcelonaOne of the headlines left this Thursday by the Roger Español case trial has to do with the interpreters who were in the courtroom, unable to translate the lawyers' questions from Catalan to Spanish. The lawyers for the private and popular accusations, exercised by Irídia, Òmnium and the ANC, ended up self-translating or questioning the police directly in Spanish after up to two interpreters could not do their job, a fact that the entities have denounced for "violation of linguistic rights". But how could this situation have occurred?

According to the Generalitat's Justice website, translations and interpretations in judicial bodies and Public Prosecutor's Offices in Catalonia are provided by the department, either through its own staff or, as is the case in most instances, through various contracted companies to which the service is outsourced. In the case of the trial of Roger Español, it is precisely a company that provided the two women who unsuccessfully attempted to translate the questions for the Spanish police officers accused of blinding the pro-independence activist in one eye.

The company in question is Ofilingua SL and its registered office is in Granada, as reported by Catalunya Ràdio and confirmed by ARA. According to the public radio station, which also revealed that the first of the interpreters at the trial is a graduate in Translation and Interpreting from the UPF and specializes in Ukrainian and Russian, the Department of Justice has awarded Ofilingua a 2.2 million euro contract for interpretation and translation services for judicial bodies and prosecutor's offices in the city of Barcelona and L'Hospitalet de Llobregat.

Government sources explain that a request has already been made to the company to "clarify immediately the failures that have occurred in the translation service" and to ensure that the service "complies with the contracted conditions." This request could lead to a sanction or, in the event of repeated failure to provide the service, to a termination of the contract. "The Government is working intensively to promote the use of Catalan also in the judicial sphere and defends the linguistic rights of all citizens," the same sources add.

In a joint statement this Friday, Irídia, Òmnium and the ANC, together with the organizations driving the #JustíciaPerRoger campaign, have described the "violation of linguistic rights" that is taking place at the trial as "intolerable." "The lawyers have been forced to self-translate into Spanish, to the point of being unable to ask questions in Catalan to some of the witnesses because the person in charge of the translation was unable to perform the task competently," they lament, noting that this violates the charter of linguistic rights of citizens before the justice system and the organic law of the judiciary.

A problem that goes back a long way

The problem with judicial interpretation has been in the news for years due to serious errors. The MIRAS group at the UAB has documented errors in English, French, Romanian, Arabic, and Chinese, among others. This study confirms that half of what is said in a trial with an interpreter is not translated for the defendant. The interpretation problem, therefore, "is not because it is in Catalan," but rather has more to do with how this service is put out to tender and awarded to agencies that repeatedly engage in bad practices. "The specifications are not an exercise in transparency and quality assurance, but rather often downward auctions: the winner is the one who presents the lowest price, without adequately demanding or verifying the training and experience of the interpreters, who also work under very precarious conditions (financial, qualifications, experience, etcetera)," explains Emma Soler to ARA, a translator and sworn interpreter, member of the International Association of Conference Interpreters and the Association of Sworn Translators and Interpreters of Catalonia.

The sector has been denouncing this situation for practically 20 years, and it has even reached the Ombudsman. "The consequences in a trial can be very serious: information that is not conveyed correctly, affecting the right to a defense and the guarantees of the process," warns the interpreter.

Lack of "transparency" of the view

Beyond the linguistic issue, the entities acting as prosecutors in the Español case also criticize the "lack of transparency" and "opacity" of a trial that—they highlight—calls upon the thousands of citizens who suffered police violence on October 1st. In this sense, they point out the "obstacles" suffered by companions and people interested in physically attending the trial as members of the public, "capacity limitations," and the "impossibility" for citizens and journalists to be able to follow the trial remotely, since the streaming service was not available during the trial this Thursday afternoon. Consulted by this newspaper, the Department of Justice has declined to comment on these issues.