Judge Juan Carlos Peinado called a basic preliminary hearing in the Begoña Gómez case with barely a day's warning. Prosecutor José Manuel San Baldomero called the rush unusual and unacceptable, saying the defense had been left out and lawyers had no real chance to respond.
Peinado retired just days after the hearing. Before stepping down, he signed an order opening an oral trial by jury for Gómez on charges of influence peddling and embezzlement, as RTVE and Democrata reported. Defense teams scrambled: Jaime Campaner, Gómez's new lawyer, had to drop everything and fly from Barcelona to Madrid. A local court canceled his other hearings so he could attend. The hearing started 45 minutes late, and Campaner barely made it from the airport.
The rush affected others, too. Cristina Álvarez, an aide at La Moncloa who also faces charges, was in Miami and could not attend. Her lawyer, José María de Pablo, asked for a delay, saying Álvarez would not return until September 28. Peinado refused, and the hearing went ahead. De Pablo appealed, but the judge dismissed the appeal just before retiring, information from legal sources.
San Baldomero put his criticism in writing on September 20. He said this pace was not normal in Spanish courts and accused the judge of exceeding reasonable limits and disregarding the lawyers' needs. The prosecutor noted that the tight schedule forced "intense and fortunate" travel, his way of describing Campaner's mad dash across Spain.
Still, San Baldomero did not support the defense's call to throw out the hearing. He acknowledged that the defense had reason to be frustrated, but argued that Spanish law does not require the accused to be present at this stage and expects hearings to take place as soon as possible. Waiting for Álvarez to return, he wrote, would have been hard to justify with September deadlines looming.
The case began with a complaint by the Manos Limpias union and had been under investigation for nearly two and a half years before reaching this stage, RTVE and Democrata reported. The Audiencia Provincial de Madrid will handle the next phase, setting a trial date and selecting a jury. That process could take 4 to 8 months, and some legal experts have suggested hearings might be postponed until the end of 2027.
The case highlights the tension between speed and fairness in high-profile trials. San Baldomero's blunt criticism is rare. In Spain, where court cases often crawl, Peinado's rush stands out for the wrong reasons.
