The Purge Board will destroy judicial files damaged by the danas

The Judicial Document Purge Board of the Comunitat Valenciana has agreed to the controlled destruction of irretrievable judicial documentation damaged by the 2019 DANA (cold drop) at the judicial headquarters of Orihuela and by the 2024 DANA at the justice offices of Aldaia, Alfafar, and Picanya. The agreement was adopted in the session held in València on June 18, 2026, and is published in the Official Gazette of the Generalitat Valenciana (DOGV) no. 10479, of October 26, 2026, section V (Announcements), with the official reference DOGV-C-2026-31916.

The announcement is signed by Pedro Luis Viguer Soler, president of the Judicial Document Purge Board of the Comunitat Valenciana, dated València, September 10, 2026, and is issued by virtue of article 16 of Royal Decree 937/2003, of July 18, on the modernization of judicial archives. The resolution is also based on articles 17.3, 18, and 20 of the same regulation and on Decree 61/2006, of May 12, of the Consell, which approves the Operating Regulations of the Purge Board (articles 8 a), b) and c) and 12.1).

The scope of the agreement is not limited to flooded papers: the Board declares completed the files of the judicial districts of València and province (section A, annexes I to XXVI), Castelló de la Plana and province (section B, annexes I to IX), and Alicante and province (section C, annexes I to XXII), submitted by the heads of the corresponding judicial bodies.

Destruction of flooded documentation

The first block of the agreement authorizes the controlled destruction of irretrievable documentation affected by the 2019 DANA at the judicial headquarters of Orihuela, kept in the Alicante archive, in accordance with the documentary lists provided by the courts of that headquarters (section D, annexes I to III).

The second block affects the irretrievable documentation from the 2024 DANA in the justice offices of Alfafar, Aldaia, and Picanya, according to the lists submitted by those same offices (section A, annexes III and IV). The list of annexes explicitly includes those of Aldaia (annex III), Alfafar (annex IV), and Picanya (annex XVIII).

Partial and total elimination of files

The resolution orders the partial elimination of files in the following matters:

• Instruction Section: indeterminate, preparatory, preliminary, and urgent proceedings, misdemeanor trials, abbreviated procedures, minor offenses, and immediate minor offenses.
• Civil Section: conciliation acts, payment orders (monitorios), other civil matters, and executions.
• Social Section: executions and files from the social courts, including those registered as occupational or professional illness.
• Criminal Section: abbreviated procedures and executions of abbreviated procedures, both with definitive archiving.
• Contentious Section: ordinary and abbreviated procedures.
• Penitentiary Surveillance Section: penitentiary surveillance files.
• Provincial Court: in criminal matters, abbreviated procedures with definitive archiving, appeal records (rollos), and executions; in civil matters, appeal records.
• Social Chamber of the TSJ: appeals against orders and judgments.
• Contentious Chamber of the TSJ: ordinary and abbreviated procedures and appeals.

Furthermore, the total elimination of execution files for misdemeanor trials is agreed upon. The sample of files will be transferred to the Arxiu Històric de la Comunitat Valenciana, the Provincial Historical Archive of Castellón, the Provincial Historical Archive of Alicante, and the Archive of the Kingdom, specifically those corresponding to procedures initiated in years ending in zero.

What is permanently preserved

In contrast to the eliminations, the Board establishes a list of permanently preserved series: habeas corpus, social dangerousness, summary proceedings, proceedings regarding violence against women (VSM), family, childhood, and capacity matters (FIC), contentious-administrative proceedings for the protection of fundamental rights and electoral matters, records and executions for minors, abbreviated procedures for corruption crimes and violence against women, and jury trials.

All proceedings up to and including the year 1940 and all matters referring to the period of the Civil War are also declared for permanent preservation. Files with historical-documentary value will be transferred to the administration competent in historical heritage, in accordance with article 18.1 of Royal Decree 937/2003.

Two months to recover submitted documents

Interested parties have a period of two months from the publication of the announcement to recover the documents they submitted to the process at the time. They may consult the notice boards at the headquarters of the Territorial Judicial Archive of Riba-roja de Túria (Valencia), at avenida dels Hostalers, s/n, Riba-roja industrial estate, sector 13, 46190, as well as in the corresponding judicial bodies.

The request must be submitted in writing to the secretary of the Board at the Conselleria de Justicia, Transparencia y Participación, Dirección General de Justicia y Autogobierno, Servicio de Gestión Administrativa y Formación, Ciudad Administrativa Nou d’Octubre, calle de la Democracia, 77, tower 4th floor 1st, 46018 València, without prejudice to the provisions of article 38.4 of Law 39/2015, of October 1. Once the deadline has passed without the return having been requested, the interested parties shall forfeit their right.

The publication of this announcement has direct consequences for thousands of litigants with old cases in the Comunitat Valenciana: those who have their own documentation in files affected by the floods or included in the ordinary weeding of the 2025 and 2026 fiscal years must act within those two months or definitively lose the possibility of recovering it.

Source: Diari Oficial de la Generalitat Valenciana (DOGV), no. 10479, of October 26, 2026, section V (Announcements), Conselleria de Justicia, Transparencia y Participación (official reference: DOGV-C-2026-31916).