The recent appearance of the Infanta Cristina before Judge Castro has awakened an intense discussion in the public about the so-called right to lie, as an integral part of the right of defense of any citizen accused in criminal proceedings. I am not referring to the centuries-old right to silence, to totally or partially conceal the truth in order not to harm oneself, not to plead guilty, at final, but to the right to lie openly to the judge in criminal proceedings, to the right to try to deceive the trainer of a case, as a concrete manifestation of the presumption of innocence and the right to effective judicial protection guaranteed in our Constitution.

Although neither the Constitution nor the Spanish laws expressly speak of a right to lie, the jurisprudence of the Constitutional and Supreme Courts have endorsed it on successive occasions with their rulings. Therefore, it can be said that in Spain this right to lie is widely accepted, which, without being absolute, aims to protect the accused in criminal proceedings in a very peculiar way. The idea, in final, is that, on the one hand, the accused can say whatever he wants to say before the judge in the criminal proceedings, but, on the other hand, he cannot allege before the courts this right to lie as a possible violation of the right to effective judicial protection. In other words, a resource appeal to the Constitutional Court based on the fact that a citizen's right to lie was violated would not prosper in our country.

The right to lie is shared by the French, insofar as they do not condemn the suspect who testifies falsely on their behalf as a perjurer. In the United States, on the other hand, an alleged right to lie would be inconceivable. The Fifth Amendment makes it clear that no one shall be compelled to be a "witness against himself," but in no way does that expression open the door to lying. Nor do the procedural safeguards incorporated in 1966 after the famous Miranda case support it. Recently, the Supreme Court declared unconstitutional a law on misappropriation of merit and protected a Californian who had the idea of presenting himself in public as a war hero and holder of the Medal of Honor. The idea then hit the press that the Supreme Court was upholding a right to lie. But it was not. What the justices actually did was to decriminalize the actions of the scoundrels, on the grounds of freedom of speech, of which Americans are so fond.

Liars and cheats are condemned by life. There is no need for the law to do it," commented one of the judges with the irony that characterizes them.

Should there really be a right to lie before a judge, in order to avoid or minimize a conviction? My answer is clear, clear, forceful. No, there should not exist in any advanced and modern democratic legal system a right to lie, as it is stated in our jurisprudence. The so-called right to lie is detrimental to society, to the legal system itself and even to the accused himself, as it violates his dignity. The right to lie does not expand the list of procedural rights and guarantees, but rather impoverishes it. The doctrine of the right to lie denigrates, stains, degrades, produces an irreparable rupture between Morals and Law, as if they were two completely different realities without any connection subject . This rupture explains why criminal trials so often become true media spectacles, and the statements of the accused become true monuments to lies, socially accepted as a means of defense and disseminated by the media. The effects of lies are corrosive, devastating in any society founded on solid ethical principles. So are the effects of controlled lies, and even those of procedural lies. Lying is lying inside and outside the process, and is neither legally nor morally justified. When it is unreservedly encouraged and practiced, society is debased and the legal system is discredited.

When lying is openly integrated into the process, the defense attorney becomes a master of deception, passionately dedicated to the art of teaching his clients to lie in order to obtain acquittals. For their part, investigating judges end up losing sensitivity to defendants who sincerely wish to tell the truth, because there is no procedural difference between declaring the truth or not, and the judge knows that it is very likely that they are trying to deceive him, as it is allowed. Thus, the judge trainer only expects the accused to transmit a coherent, congruent and plausible version of the facts, imaginatively fabricated in the law offices among codes and legends. In this way, the world of law surrounds itself with lies, simulation, fiction and appearance. And it goes astray.
The right to lie is a double-edged sword and generates a vicious circle. Lies beget lies and, when they take root in a community, social dialogue becomes very difficult. A political community must expect its citizens to tell the truth at all times. Otherwise, social cohesion is broken and the exercise of rights becomes impossible. I can think of only two exceptions, in cases involving coercion or pure entertainment. In the realm of coercion and fantasy there is no room for lies because there is no room for truth. Where there is coercion, there is no freedom, and where there is no freedom, there is no possible truth to declare. If two armed hooded men knock at my door and ask for a relative with the purpose of kidnapping him, there is no lie if attention to deceive them by saying that he has gone out, died, or whatever comes to mind, because the necessary freedom to act with free will and to be able to tell the truth is lacking. Truth and freedom go hand in hand.

In our modern criminal process, there is no coercion that nullifies freedom, as was the case, on the other hand, in certain old procedures both in European continental law and common law. If the accused is granted so many procedural guarantees, it is precisely so that the process can be held in a framework that allows the accused to declare the truth freely or to remain silent, if this is the wish of the accused. If the judge who summoned me to appear does not expect me to tell the truth, he is denigrating me, he is attacking my honorability, my dignity, since it is expected, as a matter of principle, that every person should tell the truth. It is a different matter if the person who lies in a statement as a defendant is not always punished, but the one who lies as a witness is, on the other hand, punished in order to facilitate his statement. In this case, we are no longer in the field of rights, but in the field of decriminalization, which is much broader and different.

There is also no room for lying in the world of imagination and entertainment, as I have said, since there is no intention to deceive. One does not lie when telling a joke, writing a novel, filming a fantasy movie or jocularly exaggerating a circumstance. This is obvious. Therefore, with the lie endorsed by the punitive order, the statement of the accused becomes a game, an entertainment, a media issue, a fiction, a spectacle, where the material truth is of little interest. The criminal process, however, is something more than a game. When the law becomes a game, people end up being played with and are no longer treated with the dignity they deserve.

Law is real, of content, not purely formal. It values facts, not imaginations. Therefore, objective truth is fundamental. This truth is formed on the basis of evidence and statements, and the judge must rule on them. In a democratic society, no one has the right to positively obstruct this judicial work, not even the accused. The accused can remain silent, but not lie, refrain from positively collaborating with Justice, but not obstruct the case with lies from laboratory. A society that allows to play with the truth in this way, ends up being a slave of lies. And lies sow hatred, and hatred, division. And division generates political, media and social violence. Let us rethink the criminal doctrine on the right to lie and let us build a society based on truth and freedom, and not on fallacy and spectacle.