Lorraine Williamson
Spain’s top prosecutors have opened a fresh front in one of the most politically charged legal battles in recent memory. The García Ortiz appeal bid asks the Supreme Court to wipe out the conviction that forced the former state prosecutor out of office — and it does so in unusually blunt terms, accusing the court of ignoring key evidence and straying beyond the criminal code.
At the centre sits a question that goes well beyond one man’s career: when a story is already circulating in public, where does confidentiality begin and end for a country’s highest prosecutor? Spain’s Supreme Court answered one way in November. The Fiscalía is now insisting it got it wrong.
From “leak” story to institutional collision
The Supreme Court convicted Álvaro García Ortiz of revealing reserved data, linked to an email in which businessman Alberto González Amador — partner of Madrid regional president Isabel Díaz Ayuso — offered to acknowledge two alleged tax offences as part of talks with prosecutors.
The penalty was not symbolic. The court imposed a two-year disqualification from the role, a €7,200 fine (12 months at €20 a day), and ordered €10,000 in moral damages, alongside costs that included the private prosecution.
The prosecutors’ argument: “you can’t convict on gaps”
In an “incident of nullity” filed inside the Supreme Court, deputy chief prosecutor María Ángeles Sánchez Conde argues the ruling breached fundamental rights, including the presumption of innocence and effective judicial protection. Her central claim is simple: the judges selected facts in a way that left out the very evidence that could clear García Ortiz.
Prosecutors point to witness statements from journalists who said they already had the email before García Ortiz obtained it. If that is true, they argue, the court cannot treat the prosecution service as the obvious source of a “leak” without explaining away the alternative routes.
The press note that became the turning point
One of the sharpest complaints targets how the case evolved. Sánchez Conde says the court effectively treated the Fiscalía’s public statement on the affair as criminal conduct, even though that was not debated as a charge during the investigation in the same way — leaving the defence with less opportunity to contest it.
Prosecutors also argue the judgment edges into dangerous territory: punishing the disclosure of information that, in their view, had already lost its “secret” character once it was circulating in the media. That, they say, amounts to creating a new offence by interpretation.
What the Supreme Court said — and why two judges dissented
The Supreme Court has publicly framed the principle it relied on: even if journalists know a reserved fact, that does not cancel a senior official’s duty of confidentiality.
But the court did not speak with one voice. Two Supreme Court judges, Ana Ferrer and Susana Polo, issued a dissent calling for acquittal. They said the ruling rested on inference rather than proof, and they did not see a crime in the Fiscalía’s press note. Prosecutors have leaned heavily on that dissent in their bid to overturn the conviction.
Teresa Peramato inherits the fallout
The legal fight lands as Spain adjusts to a new Fiscal General del Estado. Teresa Peramato was formally appointed in December, after government approval and the required institutional steps.
Peramato has publicly acknowledged the shockwaves the case sent through the institution and has called for internal repair. Yet the timing guarantees she begins with the Fiscalía in open conflict with the Supreme Court — a tense backdrop for any attempt to restore confidence.
Why it matters beyond a Madrid political storm
For many Spaniards, this is not just a courtroom drama. It feeds a wider sense that major institutions now operate under permanent political lighting: every decision interpreted as either a defence of neutrality or proof of partisanship.
The García Ortiz appeal bid turns that tension into a practical test. If the Supreme Court rejects it, prosecutors can still try to take the dispute further through constitutional channels — and the controversy will keep running into 2026.
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A credibility test Spain can’t dodge
Spain’s justice system depends on two ideas holding at once: judges must enforce confidentiality, and prosecutors must be able to defend their integrity when politics weaponises half-truths. The collision between the Supreme Court and the Fiscalía shows how hard that balance has become — and how quickly one email can turn into a national argument about trust.
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