Del Olmo Goes Bezerk

Today at Berria, and to think that shortsighted people dare to ask why is it that the Basques want their independence, gee I wonder why, when a "judge" holds a deteinee's lawyer incommunicado, what can be expected from the justice system in the Spanish regime?

Here you have the note:

Judge Del Olmo has lawyer Etxeberria arrested and held incommunicado

The other eight held incommunicado began to appear before the judge at 13.30 and continued into the early hours

E. Goenaga/I. Murua Uria – MADRID

At 21.45 hours yesterday Judge Juan Del Olmo announced that Enekoitz Etxeberria, the legal representative of Egunkaria S.A. and lawyer of the detainee Amando Hernandez, had been arrested and held incommunicado and was being detained in the cells of the Spanish National High Court. The lawyer Jose Mari Elosua had been with Etxeberria at the entrance of the National High Court. He saw the judge come down from his office and go up to Etxeberria to speak to him. Later he saw the judge taking the Egunkaria S.A. lawyer away with him. Shortly afterwards the clerk of the court told Elosua that Etxeberria was being detained and held incommunicado.

Elosua felt that the most normal thing would have been for Etxeberria to testify together with the remaining detainees. However, he could legally be held this way for five days. The clerk of the court said yesterday that he [Etxeberria] would, however, be testifying today after the rest had done so. Nevertheless, in Elosua’s view this latest arrest means that the police operation is still going on.

Jose Mari Elosua felt that the arrest was “excessive and out of all proportion.” “For the last eight months Etxeberria himself has been dealing constantly with all the requests of the Spanish National High Court. He has been in Madrid today [Monday] within the judge’s reach, just as he has been over the past eight months. And he was planning to be here tomorrow [Tuesday].” Elosua added that if he was involved in some judicial matter, the natural thing would have been to have left the proceedings against him until today.

Martxelo Otamendi, BERRIA’s Chief Editor, had this to say: “Egunkaria has suddenly been left without a legal representative. This is just adding insult to injury. With the situation of the detainees being held incommunicado, the arrest of the lawyer just aggravates their defencelessness”.

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