The Cassandra case (Spanish : Caso Cassandra) was a Spanish court case against Cassandra Vera Paz (born 3 November 1995). Vera was charged in 2016 with injury to victims of terrorism after she posted a series of tweets poking fun at the Franco-era assassination of Luis Carrero Blanco. In 2017, the Audiencia Nacional (National Court) sentenced her to one year in prison plus a seven year penalty of absolute disqualification, which disqualifies a convict from holding public office or employment, and disallows a convict to obtain government grants, scholarships, or any public aid. The ruling was reversed in 2018 by the Supreme Court of Spain, it found that repeating well-known jokes about an attack that happened 44 years ago, about which “endless jokes have been made”, without any abusive comments toward the victim, “is socially and even morally reprehensible in terms of mocking a serious human tragedy,” but “a penal sanction is not proportionate.” The court also took into account Vera’s age – 18 – at the time of publishing the tweets. [1]
Between 2013 and 2016, Cassandra Vera Paz published a series of tweets about the assassination of Francoist Luis Carrero Blanco. Blanco, who was Prime Minister of Spain, was assassinated by the terrorist group Euskadi Ta Askatasuna (ETA) on 20 December 1973. [2] Following an investigation conducted by the information service of the Spanish Civil Guard called Operation Araña (Operation Spider), Vera was charged for injury to victims of terrorism. [3] [4] According to Vera's testimony, on 13 April 2016, the Civil Guard summoned her to make a statement in relation to a robbery she had reported the previous year. After she arrived at the police station, Vera was informed that she had been criminally charged, and her mobile phone was seized.
Vera was charged based on the following thirteen tweets and in nearly all of them the key to the humor was the fact that the car, in which Carrero Blanco was traveling, flew high up into the air and over a five-story church, landing on the second-floor terrace of a building. (Spanish quote plus English translation). [5]
Vera appeared before the investigating judge on 13 September 2016 with her court-appointed lawyer. The lawyer was later fired because he wanted to base Vera's defense on a claim of mental insanity due to Vera being transgender, and because Vera felt he was ultra-conservative after he told Vera that he was an admirer of Blanco. [6] Vera worked with new lawyers and decided to base her defense on freedom of expression. [2]
The National Court found Vera guilty on 29 March 2017 of the crime of humiliation of the victims of terrorism. The court considered that Vera's tweets, published between 2013 and 2016, constituted contempt, dishonor and mockery towards the victims of terrorism and their families. [7] Public reaction to the ruling was quick and fierce; many, including Blanco's granddaughter, Lucía Carrero-Blanco, thought that, as regrettable as the tweets may be, freedom of expression should not lead to a prison sentence. She wrote a letter to El País criticizing the two year, six month prison sentence and described the jail term as “disproportionate and total madness,” adding: “I am frightened by a society where freedom of speech, however regrettable it might be, can mean a jail term.” [1]
Supporters retweeted the offending tweets with new supportive hashtags and some even made more offensive jokes. [8] Nonetheless, the National Court tribunal, composed of Juan Francisco Martel Rivero, Teresa Palacios, and Carmen Paloma González, sentenced her to one year in prison and revocation of her voting rights for the same time period, and seven years of inhabilitación absoluta (absolute disqualification) which disqualifies a convict from holding public office or employment, and disallows a convict to obtain government grants, scholarships, or any public aid. The court also required payment of court costs and the removal of the tweets. [9] [10] [11] The prosecutor Pedro Martínez Torrijos asked for two years and six months of prison, three years' probation, and eight years and six months of absolute disqualification. [11] [12] The sentence caught the attention of international news media and political parties such as United Left and Podemos . [13] [14] United Left retweeted the offensive tweets from its official Twitter account. [15]
The sentence was appealed before the Supreme Court of Spain citing six reasons.
The public prosecutor challenged all of these points. However, on 26 February 2018, the Supreme Court considered the appeal and reversed the National Court ruling; the court rejected the second reason, but accepted the third and considered it unnecessary to examine the remaining reasons. [16] The court concluded that the tweets did not contain any bitter comment against the victim of the attack nor did they express hurtful, cutting, or insulting phrases or comments against their person; the singular subject of the joke was in the manner in which the attack was carried out with special emphasis on the fact that the car reached a great altitude; and that the attack had taken place forty-four years ago, more than enough time to consider it a historical event whose humorous treatment cannot have the same significance as that of a recent event. Therefore, magistrate Alberto Jorge Barreiro , speaking for the court, stated that although the conduct of the accused was reproachable from a social and even moral perspective, the case did not require a response from the penal system, and that the actual response was not appropriate or proportionate. [17] The case was heard by magistrates Alberto Jorge Barreiro, Andrés Martínez Arrieta, Miguel Colmenero Menéndez de Luarca , Antonio del Moral García, and Ana María Ferrer García . [18]
Vera immediately responded to the news of the Supreme Court ruling: “I’m very happy on a personal level to see the end of a judicial ordeal that no one should have to go through. But I’m very worried about other sentences, such as that of Valtònyc and other rappers and tweeters.” [1]
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