New legal blow for the Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska. The Superior Court of Justice of Catalonia has agreed to suspend the decision taken on December 16 to dismiss Commissioner Antonio José Royo Subías as head of the Lleida National Police, after learning that 22 years earlier he had been convicted of harassing a subordinate into having sexual relations with him. In a car, overtaken by ABC and to which EL PAÍS had access, the three magistrates of the Administrative Contentious Chamber of the Fourth Section of the TSJ of Catalonia conclude that the dismissal order “could contain multiple legal defects and voidability”, among which it was adopted without listening to the high command and with the only argument that maintaining him in his functions could cause “a serious deterioration of the image of the National Police”.
For all, the magistrates agree that, until the appeal presented by the commissioner is resolved, he will again temporarily occupy the position of head of the provincial police station of Lleida. However, he also warns that this measure “does not mean perpetuating him” in this position and leaves the door open for Interior to replace him with another commissioner since Royo was appointed to this position on a provisional basis. This is not the first time that justice has corrected Grande-Marlaska for the dismissal of a police commander. In 2023, the Supreme Court ruled illegal the dismissal of Colonel Diego Pérez de los Cobos as head of the Civil Guard of Madrid.
Commissioner Royo was dismissed from his post only a week after publishing in various media, including EL PAÍS, that he had been convicted in June 2003 by the Provincial Court of Gipuzkoa for having sexually harassed an agent under his orders in 1999 and having given her “a slap on the buttocks”. Due to these events, the high command was considered the author of an offense of sexual harassment with the aggravating circumstance of superiority, for which he was sentenced to a fine of 1,080 euros and to compensate the victim with 3,000 euros. The sentence did not include any accessory penalty of disqualification (this penalty was only incorporated into this offense with the reform of the Penal Code of 2022), so the agent, who was then chief inspector of the Police Intervention Unit (UIP, colloquially known as riot police), continued in the National Police and was promoted to commissioner in 2017.
The controversy generated – which even reached the Congress and the Senate in the form of written and plenary questions in Grande-Maslaska – led the Deputy Director of Operations (DAO) of the Police, Commissioner José Ángel González, to issue a resolution the day after this sentence was pronounced, issuing a resolution dismissing Royo and assigning him to the Higher General Staff of Madrid as head of a citizen security group. As detailed in the order of the TSJ of Catalonia, the number two of the Police justified his decision by “the unrest that occurred in different institutional spheres and civil society after his appointment as police officer in the province, and due to the fact that this situation has an impact on the interest of the service, and could lead to an institutional and social detachment which could lead to a serious deterioration of the image of the National Police and an impact on the daily exercise of the activity”.
The decision was contested by the commissioner who requested that, while the appeal he presented was being resolved, the measure be temporarily suspended – he was due to return to his new post in Madrid this Friday – considering that, being very close to retirement, the immediate execution of the dismissal could cause him “serious harm which would be very difficult to repair” since when the sentence was known, he could already be retired. In addition, he considered that his dismissal also caused him “reputational damage” which he considers “essentially irreversible”, as well as a significant economic loss since the position of head of the National Police of Lleida is allocated an additional 14,500 euros per year. The Interior, through the Public Prosecutor’s Office, denied this “irreversible” damage and insisted that the suspension of the dismissal violated the “power” of the General Directorate of Police to “self-organize”.
The three magistrates have now agreed with Commissioner Royo by considering that his dismissal had not taken place “in the context of a disciplinary/sanction procedure, nor due to any current and present fact highlighting a risk in the exercise of his functions”. They also emphasize that a decision of this type “requires certain precautions and guarantees”, which have not materialized, including that of hearing the party concerned. The judicial resolution also criticizes the fact that the Interior’s decision is based “on generic formulation” regarding the impact on the prestige of the police, but does not specify “which operational events, service incidents or specific functional reasons make the dismissal essential.” He adds that this lack of motivation “is a defect which could lead to the annulment of the administrative decision”.
The order also criticizes the fact that the ministry’s resolution did not incorporate the 2003 decision that convicted Commissioner Royo for sexual harassment and only included recent journalistic reports about her that led to her dismissal. In this sense, let us recall that “the possible annulment and consequently the forgetting of the criminal record is a right that the Penal Code grants to all convicted persons and which is closely linked to the constitutional orientation of our penological system towards social reintegration”. He also points out that the fact that Interior did not take this old decision into account when accepting the appointment reveals that the dismissal was, in reality, “a temporary reaction” to the media uproar it caused.
The judicial resolution also highlights that Royo has “a long professional career of 41 years of service, with numerous public commendations (more than 80), decorations and appointments of high international responsibility as internal counselor at the Spanish Embassy in Algiers, without any incident, disciplinary or not”, so that the magistrates do not appreciate any risk in him exercising the functions of provincial head of the national police in Lleida. Indeed, he emphasizes that “the termination resolution itself does not identify citizen security issues, operational failures, loss of coordination or specific internal conflicts, but only an impact on the image.”
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