After months of inactivity, the training he leads Yolanda Diaz rescued on May 10 the controversial reform called by them “gag law”. Sumar presented an Organic Law Proposal to “amputate that norm and adapt it” to a citizen security model whose only objective seems to be to leave the agents “more unprotected and vulnerable” and open the door to “impunity for campaigns of targeting, harassment and persecution”Against them. And the list of proposals to torpedo police work seems to have no end.
Campaign of which he is also part United We Can that places the police “in the spotlight” by demanding that they be imposed fines of up to 600,000 euros. “It is no longer that they intend to cut the Organic Law for the Protection of Citizen Security, it is that they want to turn the police into their victims,” they denounce from the Spanish Confederation of the Police (CEP). Because in his opinion, this initiative is “a miserable provocation for the 225,000 professionals of all the Security Forces, that we are tired of this type of gratuitous attacks.
In his opinion, the purple formation takes another step in its strategy of harassment and demolition and tries “spread the cloak of suspicion over police officers” by making their work difficult with sanctions that would range from 25,0001 to 600,000 euros. Specifically, this initiative includes up to fourteen situations in which agents would become perpetrators of very serious infractions. Namely, according to the new article (35 bis), under the heading of “very serious infractions by the Security Forces and Corps”, a series of punishable actions are included such as “the use of rubber balls or any other instrument or product that could cause amputation, serious injury or death to a person; prevent the recording of police actions or seize graphic material without a court order; as well as seriously hindering the exercise of public freedoms and union rights.”
“Impunity in the street”
A series of obstacles whose sole objective is “impose impunity in the streets” and “avoid any intervention from us,” the CEP denounces. Because this Bill demonstrates a “alarming lack of normative knowledge” of its authors, since they have included a series of behaviors that constitute a crime or misdemeanor within the disciplinary regime of the National Police, the Civil Guard and regional and local police forces. This is the case of “acting under the influence of alcoholtoxic drugs, narcotics or psychotropic substances”, “exercising abusive, arbitrary or discriminatory practices” or “cover up the commission of a misdemeanor or crime by another law enforcement agent.” In this way, what they seek is to “disincentivize the police response.”
And while they aggravate the sanctions against the police, they reduce those of the aggressors and rescue the “a la carte fines” system, or what is the same, they intend that the sanctions for violation of this Organic Law can be suspended (depending on the financial situation of the fined), divided or even replaced by rehabilitation measures. And if this were not enough, they also intend to reduce the amounts of these fines, so “taking the street is cheaper,” they warn from this police union. Thus, the punishment for disobedience or resistance to authority, it would go from being a serious infraction (with a fine of 601 to 30,000 euros, at this time) to a minor one, with a nominal penalty of between 100 and 500 euros. If the author retracts or apologizes, the fine is void.
The silence of Marlaska
All this in the face of the lack of response from the Ministry of the Interior, which directs Fernando Grande-Marlaska, to whom they demand that he “defend” his work “without hiding or looking for excuses.” They demand that the Interior establish a clear position regarding “this serious questioning of police work” and the attempt to “discredit some professionals” who risk their lives to protect others.
From the CEP they ask the Minister of the Interior to strengthen the physical and legal protection of the agents, just at the moment when they suffer the most attacks due to interventions on the street. “Only between police and civil guards, we suffered 1,400 crimes of attack every month in 2023. An intolerable figure that shows that the principle of authority has been notably eroded due to the limited criminal punishment for hitting an agent. Faced with this, initiatives such as those of Podemos are still another contempt towards a group of hundreds of thousands of families that we continue to devote ourselves every day to the protection of the rights and freedoms of all Spanish citizens,” they conclude.