Court case against La Caixa / Trampolin Hills

 Hi, Ads

The Spanish Authorities are more than aware of the fact that few, if any, Courts in Spain is able to work within the time limits provided for in the legislation and that the delays to get issues resolved is increasing exponentially recent years.  The Bar Associations and other groups dealing with the justice systems have been bringing this to the attention of the Ministry of Justice for years.

Unfortunately, as many things today, this problem can only be started to be resolved by funding the justice system with substantial moneys.  There is an immense shortage of judges and resources in Courts,  There is barely no technology assisting in the organization and development of legal processes.  Most judges have to issue an average of 4 or 5 rulings each day, in addition to hearing, analyzing and motivating these decisions and this is just impossible to deal with with the resources available.  Although this situation is somewhat endemic and has been developing for many many years, the economic crisis and the increase in litigation has extended waiting times to an unbearable situation.  Believe me, the Spanish authorities are aware of this.

The Ministry of Justice has announced that a plan is currently being developed and implemented to ease (not to resolve) the backlog of cases.  For example, many of the non-contentious proceedings Judges have to deal with (for example marriages, divorces by mutual agreement, inheritance estates where all parties agree, among others) are in the process of being transferred to Notaries and Property Registrars who have seen their workload diminish with the crisis as opposed to that of Judges.  Plaintiffs will now have to make payment of Court costs up-front and these costs have been seriously increased this year (although the legal profession is opposing this because in a way it is a means of making justice much more expensive and less available to the poor).  The position of the legal profession is understandable but it is also true that a very substantial investment of funds into the system is required to only start dealing with the issues.

It seems to me from some of your posts that you believe that nothing is being done to remedy the situation and that Bar Associations are resigned to accept the current state of affairs.  This is far from the truth but in the present economic climate where the Goverment have had to make and still has to make substantial costs to public spending, it is going to be very difficult, if not impossible, to invest the amount of funds required to resolve this mess.

I am confident that eventually things will start to improve but I am not sure when this improvement will become noticeable enough to people waiting for justice.  So a few years of waiting and, therefore, of injustice are still ahead.  The backlog of cases is huge and, obviously, not only regarding property issues but regarding proceedings of all kinds brought before the Courts.

I am sorry to have to recognize it as it is but I wanted to let you know that you do not need to appeal to the legal professionals to bring the situation to the attention of the authorities.  They are doing what they can to assist clients with this, which is not very much in the current circumstances.

Well explained Lobin, unfortunately what you describe is the reality of the situation.  Excellent informative posting.

Kind regards

Keith

Thanks for the informative post Lobin.

I am aware of the increasing up-front court costs which means that those now endeavouring to claim their inalienable rights will be made partly financially responsible for the many years of underfunding of the Spanish Justice system, under funding which for many ironically compromised their legal position in the interim (allowing time for developers to asset strip and/or declare bankruptcy, or having to deal with collusion between conveyancing lawyers and developers, inconsistencies with interpretation of Ley 57/68 etc). This situation relating to compromising court delays was identified many YEARS ago, way before the economic downturn, and as for the Bar Associations, can it be demonstrated that they are taking a proactive approach to deter legal negligence/ lack of due diligence/failure to provide requested information by those members who have brought their profession into disrepute?

I wonder how many of these outstanding cases relate to the failure to address inalienable rights associated with offplan property purchase and correct implementation of Ley 57/68?

Does this now mean that fast tracking and specialised courts and an official ombudsman to deal specifically with claims relating to offplan deposits, BG's and implementation of Ley 57/68 (as advocated by Keith in his BG petition) is now dead in the water, or could this be a viable means of speedily clearing the backlog of related cases?

Can you advise on what grounds the case was lost?

 The judge said that for the bank to be liable the deposits must be paid into a special account.

As this appears another case where judicial misinterpretation may apply (it appears to be an ongoing educational process by the judiciary), is there a case to say that all new actions against a Bank should also include the developer/conveyancing lawyer so as to ensure that the purchaser will receive a ruling to ensure the ley law is fully adhered to (no matter who is made ultimately responsible) and thereby not have to incur appeals/Supreme Court/ongoing negligence cases etc.

In cases such as this relating to inalienable rights the purchaser appears to be at risk of having to incur more and more financial obligations to meet ongoing justice..... this is exactly why I was hoping that your analysis from your BG petition should be recognised Keith, where you stipulate the need for specialsed fast track courts.... surely the innocent purchaser should not be subjected to this failure to recognise inalienable rights (whether this be first instance, appeal etc) or be financially compromised in the interim, (especially those not protected by group action).

Failure to recognise rights as per the law also clogs up an already overstretched court system with appeals etc, and without specialised judicial knowledge this only magnifies the problems that we are sadly witnessing within the Spanish system of justice at this time.

Pff001,

Does this first instance ruling have anything to do with Cajamar not signing a collective guarantee with Trampolin Hills?

I noticed on your thread back in 2011 that there was some outstanding query in this regard. http://www.eyeonspain.com/forums/posts-long-13351.aspx

How did this buyer (Alec John Edwards)  get his money back when me and all of the others i have spoke too didnt ?

I can not post the link from GM Legal Experts blog but here is part of the article.

Although the details change, there are many more customers who, against all odds, are recovering the money they gave for promotions ghost. Alec John Edwards is a fire service technical Liverpool in 2009 gave 150,000 euros as a deposit for a house in the Trampolin Hills, in a tiny town in Murcia: "As we are not asked to run the support built, but the bank refused ". Two months ago, after a lawsuit, regained the 150,000 euros, and still can not believe. His lawyer, Guadalupe Sanchez, says that the British are more accustomed to plead: "For the Spanish find it harder to go against the dealer. The Anglo-Saxons have more internalized it. " Antonio Flores, Malaga lawyer specialized in serving foreign customers in real estate, agrees: "They insisted much more and demanded a response from the system."

 My apologies i have just read it again and this buyer had a BG where as we did not.

The existence of a bank guarantee shouldn't make any difference to the outcome, and you are right to question why he (Alec John Edwards) got his money back and you and others did not.

What happens if Judge did not cancel our contract

you are right to question why he (Alec John Edwards) got his money back and you and others did not.

Lost the latest appeal as well. Crazy!

Is it really worth persuing yet another appeal, this time to the High Court, on the back of these set backs?

Could be costly!