Barcelona legal bar association sees Catalan Trial sentence as 'unjust and disproportionate'

The head of the Barcelona legal bar association (ICAB), Maria Eugènia Gay, said on Monday that the Supreme Court's ruling on the Catalan Trial was "unfair and disproportionate." 

In October, nine Catalan independence leaders were handed prison sentences of between 9-13 years for their roles in holding a referendum deemed outlawed by Spanish authorities to secede from Spain.

Gay, daughter of former Vice President of the Constitutional Court Eugeni Gay, said that ICAB's governing body and other institutions see it as a must to return to “dialogue” in a “calm, coherent” manner and “within the legal framework.” 

She also said the ruling "did not respond to the needs of Catalonia." "We all agree that it was disproportionate and an unfair sentence," she said.

In a debate over the consequences of the ruling, Gay said it was necessary to return to the dialogue she had sought to reopen in the weeks leading up to the unilateral declaration of independence in October 2017, and talk about “points of debate that had started,” urging it to be done in a “serene, coherent” way. 

She also underlined that this dialogue should be done “within the framework of legality as is necessary in a democratic society."