The National Court has given the go-ahead for the investigation of Dina Bousselham, former adviser to former Podemos leader Pablo Iglesias, and her partner, Ricardo S.F., for alleged crimes of perjury, false denunciation and simulation of crime in relation to the piece of the Villarejo case in which the alleged theft of her mobile card is investigated.

In an order, against which there is no appeal and to which Efe has had access, the third Criminal section rejects Bousselham’s appeal against the decision of the judge in the Villarejo case, Manuel García Castellón, to deduct testimony from the courts of Madrid and Alcorcón, and to which Pablo Iglesias himself and the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office also joined.

The Chamber rejects one of the main arguments to oppose this measure and that is that the deduction of testimony “against the complainant or accuser” is only possible when there is a final judgment.

For the court, that would be the case for the crime of false denunciation, but not “with respect to the other alleged crimes.”

However, he admits that the state of the case “is decisive” to be able to prosecute the remaining crimes, “both to elucidate the existence of a possible simulation of a crime, and to know if the testimony that is considered false is going to be practiced again” in a future trial or “lacks a further procedural journey”.

However, it observes that the state in which the procedure is found corresponds to determine it to the court “in its competent case for the investigation of the alleged crimes for which the testimonies have been deducted.”

Thus, and although this piece of the Villarejo case remains open, “it is no less true”, indicates the order, that “prior proceedings have already been initiated in this regard by the Investigating Courts of Madrid and Alcorcón”, a town in Madrid in which it was denounced for the theft of the mobile.

Both courts are now pending to determine which is responsible for the investigation, according to the Court. At the moment it is known that the matter has fallen to the investigating court number 46 of Madrid, which has not yet adopted any decision, according to legal sources explained to EFE.

Given this circumstance, it adds, the estimation of these resources is useless” and this “without going into the substantive reasons for the appeal, nor the prosperability of the deduction of testimonies”.

“And this, obviously without prejudice to the fact that the Court (or Courts) responsible for the investigation (…) must first clarify, before entering into the investigation of the facts, the procedural issues and the requirement of procedural reference to the cause of origin”, concludes the order.

García Castellón agreed on September 1 this deduction of testimony by admitting a request in this regard from the Association of European Jurists Prolege.

In that order, the magistrate recalled that he had already highlighted the contradictions in the witness statements of Dina Bousselham and Ricardo S.F. in the reasoned statement that he submitted to the Supreme Court in October 2020.

On that occasion, he also asked the Supreme Court to investigate the then Second Vice President of the Government, Pablo Iglesias, for discovery or disclosure of secrets, computer damage and false accusation or complaint and simulation of crime in relation to the theft of his former adviser’s mobile phone.

The Supreme Court, however, filed the case and returned it to the National Court so that Judge García Castellón exhausted the investigation.

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