“Intellectual brilliance”, the sixth generation of a family with a toga, is charged with the biggest mistake in the history of the Supreme

With your vote amazing, end of a deliberation of 15 hours, favored the banking industry in the judgment of the tax to mortgages,

He does not have a mortgage, married a lawyer of French that was his student and is not the first time and is questioned. It is the case of Luis María Díez-Picazo

The banks will pay the tax of the mortgages from this Saturday and not be able to deduct

banks, exempt from paying the mortgage tax on loans to the State, Church or political parties

it All happened in the regio plenary hall. In the center of the presidential table, sitting in one of the chairs with upholstered garnet and under an immense ceiling lamp golden, Luis María Díez-Picazo directed the debate with an iron hand. To his right and to his left, also with a toga, the judges rapporteurs. And on the sides, forming a “u”, the rest. In all, 28 judges.

The format, the set: first spoke of less seniority, after the veterans. And at the pace that the president marked, took the floor and voted in a loud voice: “estimate”, “dismiss”, “favor”, “against”… As always in the full of the Third court, the Contentious-Administrative of the Supreme Court. But this time was different.

In an atmosphere of tension and division, aware that they were in the air half of Spain (the politicians, the banks, the Stock exchange and more than a million and a half customers who believed that they would reimburse up to 1.5% of the amount of their claims), the 28 judges deliberated during two sessions, marathon, on Monday and Tuesday, 10 the morning seven and half in the afternoon (with a break of less than two hours to eat), about who should pay the so-called tax on the mortgage: the bank or the client.

Decided, but the bill has been high. Their 15 hours of lockdown is ended with the higher self to the credit of the Spanish Justice in the past few years. Because it has spread the impression that the Supreme court has bowed to the interests of the banking industry (as well as resume we Can, that they immediately convened a concentration of revulsion at their doors), and as guilty as they point to him, to the chairman of the board, Luis María Díez-Picazo Giménez. The man at the center of the “u”, member distinguished of a long saga.

Ancestors jurists

you have to go back at least to the NINETEENTH century to find the ancestor jurist oldest of Luis María Díez-Picazo. Was the father of her great-great-grandfather, Francisco Ponce de León and Martínez, lawyer and notorious carlist of Albacete. He was also a jurist and his son, John Galo Ponce de Leon and Wallet; and the son of the latter, José Ponce de León and the Oak…

That on the part of the family of his maternal grandmother. Because by the paternal race, the Diez-Picazo is also blunted. The grandfather, who was called Luis Díez-Picazo as himself, was a lawyer litigador, and his father, of the same name, continued with the tradition: Luis Díez-Picazo and Ponce de León, who died three years ago, it was all an eminence in the Civil Law, judge at the Constitutional Court (1980-1989) and founder of the firm family Díez-Picazo Abogados, which have fought several of his five sons, of whose professional positions assumed to the firm.

Ignacio, professor of Procedural Law, heads the firm. José María is a technician of the town Hall of Madrid. And the twins Gem and Teresa are legal of the Constitutional Court and secretary to the board of directors of the financial valenciana Libertas 7, respectively.

Your tataratatarabuelo was already a lawyer in Albacete. And his father, a judge of the Constitutional

Luis Maria, born in Madrid in 1958, is the first-born. And the most high has come.

Bright as his father, at 25 years old he had already graduated in Law at the Autonomous University of Madrid, with extraordinary prize, and had the phd at the University of Bologna. His next step was to take a square as a counsel of the Ministry of Justice (figure assimilated later to the out of State lawyer).

from there began a solid career in the classroom. He gave lectures at the universities of Malaga, Castilla-La Mancha, at the prestigious European University Institute in Florence -according to a friend of that time, there he met a student of French that was to become his wife, Marie Jose Garot, today a jurist, expert on community Law, in the Judicial School of Barcelona,…

In 1999, with 41 years, he succeeded in the chair of Constitutional Law. And there could have been. But in 2008, he gave a twist that you may now you though: through the so-called fifth turn, that is to say, not a career judge but by his prestige, he entered a magistrate of the Third Chamber of the Supreme Court.

Appointment questioned

Its critics say that it was her alleged proximity to the ruling Popular Party that allowed him to climb. A proximity that is based on their involvement in various acts of the Foundation for Social Studies and Analysis (FAES), and in the fact that the then popular minister of Justice, Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón, we chose to preside over the committee of experts called to propose a reform of the Organic Law of the Judiciary.

The case is that, by surprise, and after seven years as a magistrate satin, her name appeared on the shortlist to chair the Third division, of major political burden because he judges the acts of public administrations, including the Government, and the decisions of the General Council of Judicial Power (CGPJ). He was president, responsible to the Supreme, the almighty Carlos Lesmes, who promoted to the position in a personal effort that gave much to talk about.

In the high court there is an unwritten rule that says that the presidents of the Chamber, except for incompetence manifests itself, renew its mandate at least once. Well, in 2015, for the first time is violated. All the judges appointed on the proposal of the PP continued to Lesmes and voted in favour of his protégé, so that the progressive José Manuel Sieira, Lesmes was faced, was relieved.

That sat very badly on the Supreme. And sounded accusations of political interference. All of the associations judicial, except the closest to the PP, it denounced. The progressive Justices and Judges for the Democracy and the Judicial Forum Independent of the hand of the platform Rights International Spain (RIS), took the case to the United Nations, in particular, the Special Rapporteurship onand independence of judges and lawyers.

Your friend, Carlos Lesmes he clinched the presidency of the Room. Now their relationship is broken

In its communication, dated July 29, 2015 and who has had access Chronic, found that the appointment was a clear manifestation of “the difficult situation that crosses the independence of the judiciary in Spain”, because he had not adhered to the principles of merit and capacity (Sieira had more experience in tasks of government and had 22 years in the Supreme, compared to the seven of Díez-Picazo), and also because the press had echoed of “possible pressure” to the members of the CGPJ to vote in their favor.

For this reason, they asked that the rapporteur of the UN came to Spain to ask for explanations. The efforts of this agency are confidential and platforms Spanish received no response. What is certain, in any case, is that in these three years, the visit claiming has not occurred.

A judge of the Supreme who stood between the conservatives sums up the beginning: “In the Third Room, where there are 30 judges, each of your father and of your mother, Díez-Picazo, that does not have a kind character, entered like a bull in a china shop”.

“it Is a very good professor of Constitutional Law, but without experience as a judge,” says a lawyer who knows him. “In addition, while it is a good person, he has inherited the worst of his father: his character. It is arrogant, arrogant, sometimes nasty. That’s why the Supreme court has not made many friends”.

Three years after what has come to your nightmare. The way in which it has managed the matter of the Tax on Documented Legal Acts (a tax on the notarial deed that the customer pays when signing a mortgage, they raise the autonomous communities and is located between the 0.5% and 1.5% of the purchase value) is questioned by all, including their related. He is reproached for his failure: he should have watched more in the process and managed to best the times.

on The 19th of October, the day following the day that made public the judgement of the Second Section that superseded the case law of more than two decades which imposed the payment of the tax to customers, Díez-Picazo announced that it would convene a plenary to address the scope of this decision by “the enormous economic and social impact” of the failure. Banks fell on the Stock exchange, the signing of mortgages came to a standstill… In a gesture unusual, Carlos Lesmes, his boss and friend, asked publicly for forgiveness… responsabilizándole to him.

And Díez-Picazo was noted. It has been published that has five real estate properties, all free of mortgages, and have been attributed personal interests in financial institutions.

on the one hand, because for two years, and with the permission of the CGPJ, he combined his work in the Supreme with the professor at the Colegio Universitario de Estudios Financieros (Cunef), property of the Spanish Association of Banking; although judicial sources consulted stress that it is ludicrous to suggest that a magistrate of such a level can be sold for “so little pay” for this type of classes. In the second place, the defence which he made of banking the law firm of Diez-Picazo in the highly publicized case of clauses soil has also helped to feed that image.

“If I vote in favor, a tie, so vote against it,” settled at the last moment. And tipped the scales

however, and although I accuse of having sold out to the banks, what is certain is that the idea that Díez-Picazo called the full was the opposite: he wanted to retain the decision taken three weeks ago by the Second Section, that is to say, to pay the banking, although, yes, pleading not to implement any retroactive effect and that the change only had an effect in new loans.

When in the last minute of Tuesday afternoon ordered to vote for an all-or-nothing without more delay, between the protests of the magistrates, they asked for more debate, and the result was 14 votes in favour of exempting banks and 13 against, Díez-Picazo settled: “If you vote in favor, a tie, so I vote against”, as he has told The Independent.

The swerve last minute

In this way, voting against their original intentions (perhaps due to their rejection of manifest to the meetings too long, and this was it), tilted the balance. For respite from the farms of the autonomous community, they risked having to return around 5,000 million euros if it accepted a retroactive four years, as calculated by the Government.

In the wake of this crisis, the relationship with Lesmes, the man who helped, “is broken completely,” says a judge of the Supreme. “As a professional, is very competent. And what has happened… closed chapter. We have to think of the good of the Court”, adds one of their top rivals in the Supreme. “It is an intellectual gloss that fluent in five languages [Spanish, English, French, Italian, and German] and that has gotten a shrimp of three pairs of noses”, concludes another.

“Put tags political for judges it is a hoax. In my particular case I think it is,” said Díez-Picazo in one of the rare interviews he has granted, when he was appointed. Before the plenary of the CGPJ, to defend his candidacy, he proclaimed: “I Am a patriot and I want what is best for my country and I fight for what is best.” What about your future? There are some who says that his dream was to follow in the footsteps of his father and to get to the Constitutional Court. Today it is more difficult.

According to the criteria of

Learn more