Bibiana Palomar: "I remember retirees crying"

Bibiana Palomar has spent years navigating paperwork. Before, it was boxes and filing cabinets; now, more often, she's in front of screens. She leads a team that handles an essential but little-known task within the judicial system: cleaning up the multitude of documents generated by the administration of justice—not just paperwork, but also the court records used as evidence in trials.

Let's talk about rats…

— They appeared in the basement of the courthouse. In a very funny cartoon in a newspaper, a rat was putting up the sign for "general archives," and one person said to another: "Why don't we put out rat poison and get rid of it?" And the other replied: "It's the only one that knows where the files are."

Was he right?

— Yes, we're a bit like little rats who tidy up and classify all the documentation.

What do you remember about the first day?

— A labyrinthine and dark space. It was 1991, and the Generalitat had recently acquired jurisdiction over justice. When I saw it, I thought it would last six months.

More than 30 years have passed.

— In that same dark space, under some stairs, there were some bags labeled "for disposal." I started trying to piece together the files, and I came across a case concerning the annulment of a canonical marriage.

What was being said?

— It was an ecclesiastical trial in which they were trying to prove the existence of an unconsummated marriage in order to obtain an annulment. The most shocking thing is that I suddenly realized I knew the family of one of the people being prosecuted.

And did he tell her?

— No. Archivists operate on the principle of silence without the consent of all parties involved. But I saw that by safeguarding documents that could have been destroyed, I was enabling someone, someday, to reconstruct their personal history.

Why is it important to preserve this procedure?

— Behind these documents lies a historical value that allows us to recover the historical memory, both individual and collective, of our country.

What is the oldest document you have?

— The fund of the royal audience.

I mean…

— The first body responsible for administering justice in the Principality, from 1493 until the Nueva Planta Decrees. Its existence was unknown; we discovered it when we were able to access the basement of the Palace of Justice, in an area called Pous Negres.

Pozos Negros sounds awful.

— It was an area of dampness and decay. There we find evidence of the functioning of civil law during the time of the Crown of Aragon, or the archives of the court of political responsibility.

So what?

— Fines and confiscation of property were levied against those who were part of the Republican side. We have compiled a comprehensive catalog of 18,000 files, which are currently being reviewed, and we are eager to share it.

The worst moment.

— The year was 2005. In the early hours of April 18th, a pipe burst. By 8 a.m., files were floating around the courtyard. We spent months working, drying them out… We recovered all 8,500 files. And shortly after, a fire.

What happened?

— It was done because they wanted to destroy some evidence. As was said at the time, it was the area where Javier de la Rosa's file was located.

Did it go well for them?

— No. We saved that file. In fact, 1,200 were lost, but we identified which ones they were and reconstructed them.

Today you need to be very confident.

— Maximum. In the City of Justice there are compact motorized vehicles, completely fireproof.

And do families come looking for, for example, inheritances?

— Of course, we have a lot of documentation that says who is responsible for a certain thing.

A preferred document.

— A case from 1940 involved nine women working in a textile factory. Some were 30 years old and had been with the company for 20 years. They had started working there at the age of 10. The owner announced layoffs, and these women, who were illiterate, banded together to request a written statement declaring that they all wanted to stay on and that they wanted to share their salaries. The owner refused, but what they represented—that spirit of solidarity—struck me as beautiful.

An image she won't forget.

— Retirees crying. Before, certified copies weren't made; only the original existed, which the parties had to provide to the court. And for many years, many people came needing documents for their retirement. And they were risking a higher pension. I remember cases where, when they found the documents, they cried with emotion.

Also keep evidence for trials.

— Yes, we keep what isn't dangerous or doesn't come in large volumes. We're doing a lot of sampling work, for example, with drugs and marijuana. We keep only a small portion because otherwise the Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police), our court buildings, and our storage facilities would be overwhelmed.

I suppose it doesn't mean specific cases.

— Many of those who have appeared in the press. I can't say more.

Is paper a thing of the past?

— Right now we monitor 331 kilometers. That's from the Ebro Delta to Cape Creus. But we're in a period of transformation. The problem is that people often think everything in electronic files is very easy to manage. But it goes through the same filters as paper documents.

And what gets eliminated?

— Let's create tables that establish the lifespan of that documentation: five years, ten years... whatever. And we always take a sample of files, especially to see the legislative changes that have occurred in the Administration of Justice.

Why is their work important?

— An organization as complex as the Justice Administration must have everything perfectly organized, classified, and inventoried. But then there's the other aspect we mentioned, not only the day-to-day operations, but also the recovery of a country's individual and collective memory.