A judge opts alone for a Commercial Court in Las Palmas without meeting the requirements

A practicing judge in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria may be appointed this Wednesday by the Permanent Commission of the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) as the new head of Commercial Court number 2 of that same judicial district without meeting the legal requirements demanded for a body judicial that requires a specialization that the applicant does not have.

This is stated in a challenge filed before the governing body of the judges by the Association of European Jurists Prolege, based in Madrid, which understands that in this case article 329 of the Organic Law of the Judiciary is violated. This article requires that aspiring judges must pass a regulated prior training process, two exercises, one theoretical and one practical, as well as take a seven-week theoretical-practical course at the Judicial School.

As published by the CGPJ in the Official State Gazette (BOE) on October 18, the only candidate for head of Mercantil 2 of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria is Judge José Ramón García Aragón, currently head of the Court of First Instance 7 of the same judicial party, which is not in possession of the regulated training required by law.

This appointment has caused surprise in the forum taking into account that Mercantil 2, which has been left vacant, has been in the hands of a substitute judge, Carlos Vielba, for barely a month, assigned to the Provincial Court of Las Palmas, so it does not The rush to fill the starting position is understandable. But it still causes more perplexity, and this is also reflected in Prolege’s challenge, that it does not wait for a judge assigned to a court in San Bartolomé de Tirajana, Matías Martínez Gómez, who is currently undergoing the relevant training of the Council General of the Judiciary, can access that position with all the requirements under his belt. His name appears in the BOE along with that of a dozen judges and magistrates who are currently training to access Commercial Courts throughout Spain.

Prolegue’s challenge says that “it makes no sense to definitively award the ownership of the Commercial Court square number 2 of Las Palmas to a person who does not meet the conditions considered optimal and necessary for natural access to said position, such as D. José Ramón García Aragón instead of delaying its award a little, with the imminent arrival on the market of new specialists with better rights and qualifications for their award, who will see their qualifications and effort poorly performed by performing different generic functions to those for whom they have studied and proven their worth.”

And the challenge, signed by ICAM lawyer Carolina Mata de la Torre, recalls that “the Commercial Courts were created to place certain matters that required it in the hands of specific and highly qualified judicial bodies, extracting them for such reasons. of the saturated general courts of Instance, all through the promulgation of Organic Law 8/2003 of July 9 for the Bankruptcy Reform, coming into operation on 09/01/2004.”