Swiss authorities deny judge permission to use Bárcenas’ account data in trial

Initially, the Federal Justice Office (OFJ) allowed judge Pablo Ruz to use all the paperwork he applied for in trying Bárcenas and other parties charged in connection with the infamous Gürtel corruption racket, but the Federal Criminal Court of Switzerland has overturned this and denied Ruz permission to do so.

Bárcenas’ solicitor had appealed against the OFJ’s consent granted to judge Ruz on the grounds that, in accordance with European law, the account-holders in question were required to be given the right to a hearing and subsequent appeal before the information was used as evidence against them – something that had not taken place.

The Federal Criminal Court of Switzerland upheld this argument and blocked the National Court in Spain from using data concerning the extreasurer’s own accounts and those of his Company Tesedul at the LGT Bank in Geneva.

Its panel of judges, Stephan Blättler, Giorgio Bomio and Nathalie Zufferey Franciolli, agreed Bárcenas’ ‘right to be listened to’ and ‘right to legally defend himself’ would be ‘seriously violated’ if they allowed the OFJ verdict to stand.

This data was acquired by judge Ruz in July 2012, and he duly contacted the Swiss authorities to request permission to use it in investigations into offences related to corruption, not just of a fiscal nature – according to a bilateral agreement between Switzerland and Spain, the latter is not permitted to use account information merely to follow up financial or tax-related crimes.

However, the recent verdict found that the OFJ had not given sufficient reasons to justify why it believed the documents would in fact be used to investigate corruption charges rather than purely financial ones.

All this does not mean the documents obtained are now redundant – merely that the entire process has to start again from scratch.

The OFJ will need to give Bárcenas, and possibly his ‘front man’ Iván Yáñez, a right to a hearing and appeal, and only after this will it be able to authorise judge Ruz to use the paperwork giving details of the bank accounts – unless it decides not to grant this permission based upon the answers given by the accused.

Bárcenas has been in jail since July 27 last year in connection with alleged cash-in-hand dealings within the PP party and his suspected role in the Gürtel corruption racket based upon his holding accounts in Swiss banks with at least 47 million euros stashed in them.