This is about the second redress appeal above, and in this case the Constitutional Court rules that 1) Alouni's right to freedom was indeed violated; 2) the preventative prison decrees from October and November 2005 are overturned.

However, the Constitutional Count says it is up to the lower court to decide whether this means Alouni should be freed - and the actual conviction or its confirmation by the Supreme Court are not overturned so that persumably won't be the case.

So the damage Alouni is now ruled to have suffered is to have been imprisoned preventatively pending appeal of his first conviction by the National Court. The actual problem here is the slowness of the justice system. I wonder whether Alouni can now seek compensation...

This is not two rulings by the same court on the same case, but 1) an earlier procedural decision (Auto) that, given that the conviction was now upheld, Alouni couldn't be freed; a final sentence ruling on the substance of the appeal (Sentencia) which refers to the previous Auto in section I.5.

What should be interesting in this case are the "legal grounds" (fundamentos jurídicos) of the sentence, which become jurisprudence for future cases.

En un viejo país ineficiente, algo así como España entre dos guerras civiles, poseer una casa y poca hacienda y memoria ninguna. -- Gil de Biedma