David Maman Benchimol, the judge in charge of the rape complaint filed by a subordinate against Commissioner José Ángel González, former head of the Police, “understands” why women go to court to request a protection order against their partners or ex-partners because they have “so many advantages” when reporting: “They are given free legal assistance; even if they have a million euros in their account, they are given a public defender as soon as they enter (…)”. “But what do they lose?” asked the head of Madrid’s Court of Violence against Women No. 8 at a conference at the Madrid Bar Association on February 18. A month after his words, the magistrate rejected the complainant’s request to prohibit José Ángel González from communicating with her.
In the talk, focused on criminal procedure and especially on the jurisdiction of the courts, Maman is critical of the fact that courts of violence against women — which have not only criminal but also civil jurisdiction — have become “an almost forced path” and especially with the ease with which protection orders are granted to complainants: “Lawyers are very fond of visiting us; it annoys me, but I understand it, they try to force a path.” “If I’m going to take 24 hours to get a protection order, why am I going to wait months?” he asks.
“Having learned of the instructing magistrate’s statements, we deeply disagree with them, considering them unfortunate and hoping that they are limited to the magistrate’s right to freedom of expression, which we respect as he respected that of the private prosecution,” Jorge Piedrafita, the lawyer for the former DAO’s complainant, tells this newspaper. He adds: “However, if in the course of the investigation any arbitrary conduct due to sexist bias is observed, this lawyer will be obliged to request recusal in defense and protection of his client, a victim of sexual assault in a context of violence against women.” Reported by Irene Dorta.
According to the victim’s account, the suspected events occurred in April 2025, when the agent “was on duty” and “received the order to go with an unmarked car to the restaurant where the DAO was eating with another commander.” Then, as the lawyer added in a statement, she was ordered to take him to his “official residence, owned by the Ministry of Interior,” where the defendant sexually assaulted her “with penetration.”
The complainant asserts that the Deputy Operational Director used his “authority” to commit the alleged assault, which “caused her injuries” and lasted “until the victim was able to break free and flee the ministerial residence.” “Subsequently, the victim was directly coerced by the defendant and indirectly by other high-ranking police officials not to report the facts, which has led her to be on psychological leave with the withdrawal of her weapon and medical incapacity to perform her duties,” added lawyer Jorge Piedrafita.
Shared custody
“If I were a lawyer, I would say: ‘You tell me everything’ and then I would go and file the complaint, even if it made little sense,” Maman emphasizes in the talk. The magistrate also criticizes that filing a complaint with the court allows women to get rid of shared custody of their children, a figure for which “women are staunch enemies”: “I still don’t understand why women have such animosity towards shared custody when the Supreme Court has said 300 million times that it is the desirable option.” And he insinuates that the complainant in these processes “thinks that with shared custody [the defendant] will no longer pay child support.”
Article 92.7 of the Civil Code rules out shared custody if there is an open violence procedure or if the judge finds evidence of it. This provision was brought before the Constitutional Court, which refused to annul it in 2022. “Article 92.7 provides no exception and is deadly,” the judge states in the talk. The head of Madrid’s Court of Violence against Women No. 8 says that judges find themselves at “a crossroads”: between fathers who want it “often for economic reasons” and women who have “animosity” towards shared custody.
The magistrate adds that the slowness of the processes benefits women in cases that should be dismissed “from minute one,” but which end up in appeal at the Audiencia. While these appeals are being resolved, Maman laments, they cannot grant shared custody and the process “becomes eternal”: “And, in the meantime, that child, little by little, the mother will brainwash him, and that child will progressively separate from the father, and then it is very difficult to recover that lost time.”
Mamam is, however, critical of other aspects of the law or jurisprudence that harm women. In his conference, which lasted more than two hours, the judge states that the crime of non-payment of alimony “is not only suffered by the children, it is suffered by the mother, because what [the father] does not pay, the mother pays.” For this reason, he argues, the courts of violence against women should be competent. The Provincial Court of Madrid understands that this issue is only within the jurisdiction of these specialized courts when the non-payment is accompanied by a crime of violence.
In statements collected by EFE, the Minister of Health, Mónica García, stressed this Thursday that these words, advanced by La Sexta, are “of impressive gravity and sexism.” “This is what must be fought: sexism is installed in our society and in our institutions,” she added.
