Spain’s top criminal court on Monday removed Catalan nationalist figurehead Jordi Pujol from a corruption trial owing to the declining health of the 95-year-old, a titan of modern democratic Spanish politics.
The trial of Pujol and his seven children for alleged criminal association and money laundering centres on the origin of the fortune of the man who led Catalonia’s regional government from 1980 to 2003.
Pujol revealed in 2014 that his family kept undeclared money for more than 30 years in Andorra, a tiny state perched in the Pyrenees mountains between Spain and France.
He said the money was an inheritance from his father, a wealthy businessman, and denied it came from kickbacks for public contracts during his time in office.
After years of investigations, Pujol and his children were ordered to stand trial, with prosecutors seeking nine years in prison for the former Catalan leader.
But from the outset his frail health and cognitive decline put in doubt whether he would take part in the trial, which started in November.
Pujol’s lawyers said he was physically unable, but Madrid’s Audiencia Nacional court first decided he would follow the proceedings by video link from his Barcelona home.
But the court withdrew Pujol from the trial on Monday after receiving new medical reports and holding a brief conversation with him before his scheduled declaration.
“It is impossible for Mr Jordi Pujol Soley to continue in this trial with full consciousness and abilities, therefore it is decided that from this moment… he is left out of the proceedings,” the court’s president said.
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The trial continues for the children, who face jail terms of up to 29 years if convicted.
After the death of longtime dictator General Francisco Franco in 1975, Pujol became one of democratic Spain’s most influential politicians as leader of Catalonia’s now defunct centre-right Convergence and Union alliance that supported minority governments in Madrid.
In exchange, Pujol won more powers for Catalonia in health, education and policing, earning him the nickname of “Spain’s viceroy”.
Despite championing Catalan nationalism for decades, which saw Franco’s regime jail him for two years, he always argued the wealthy northeastern region should remain a part of Spain.
