Last victim of Franco refused rights

28 May 2004

MADRID – Spain’s Constitutional Court said it “sadly” had to refuse Friday to grant a legal order in favour of one of the last victims of Franco’s dictatorship.

Francisco Baena Alonso was executed in September 1975, two months before the death of Franco.

His mother Estrella Alonso Soto had applied to the court to grant the order because she claimed her son’s constitutional rights had been violated by the regime of the dictator.

She argued that the present Spanish Constitution guaranteed the right to life and not to suffer inhumane or degrading treatment.

The court recognised the seriousness of the case but said that it  could not grant the order because it had been “set up 22 years ago but the case related to a matter which happened nearly 30 years ago”.

José Humberto Francisco Baena was ordered to be executed by the Council of War of the Franco regime which had accused him of killing a police officer in July 1975.

He was put to death in Hoyo de Manzanares, in Madrid.

The court ruled that although consitutional rights protected the citizen with fundamental rights, these could not be applied retrospectively.

Franco died in November 1975, heralding the transition to democracy.

The Constitutional Court was set up in 1982, four years after the modern Spanish constitution came into force.

[Copyright EFE with Expatica]

Subject: Spanish news