Baltasar Garzon, a Spanish "investigative magistrate" in charge of investigating crimes of national or international significance, is now himself under investigation. Conservative groups accuse Garzon of prevaricato judicial (roughly translated as "abuse of a judge's power") for having intentionally bypassed a 1977 amnesty law, opening an investigation on human rights abuses committed during Spain's civil war. If indicted on the charge, the General Council of the Judiciary may temporarily remove him from office.

For many years, Garzon has engaged in a crusade against al-Qaida terrorists, Latin American dictators (including Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet,) Russian thugs and powerful Spanish politicians accused of corruption. In addition, he started an investigation of torture claims by former Guantanamo detainees and for crimes committed by Colombia's FARC rebels.

Garzon pursued those cases under a controversial statute (subsequently repealed) allowing Spanish courts to exercise "universal" jurisdiction over crimes against humanity, regardless of the country where they were perpetrated and the nationality of victims or perpetrators. These high-profile cases brought Garzon powerful enemies all over the world, not to speak of the antagonism he provoked in Spanish government officials and among his own colleagues, many of whom see him as an embarrassing self-promoter.