SPAIN – On June 2, 2020, an agent of the Spanish National Police Force (CNP) began infiltrating the pro-independence left and the housing movement under the false identity of Marc Hernández Pon. Seven months after publishing it in this medium, we have certified that he was not alone. At the same time, a young Mallorcan who called himself Daniel Hernàndez Pons landed in the Sant Andreu de Palomar neighborhood of Barcelona. After a long and thorough investigation the Directahas been able to confirm that we are facing an operation to introduce multiple spies into activism, under the hierarchical baton of the Spanish Minister of the Interior Fernando Grande-Marlaska. It should be remembered that according to the current legal framework, this type of infiltration can only be carried out under a court order, in cases of terrorism, organized crime and drug trafficking.
At the beginning of June 2020, this second infiltrator, who was then 31 years old, appeared for the first time at the gym of the occupied La Cinètika social center, on Paseo de Fabra i Puig in Barcelona. “He said he had found the address on the internet while looking for an inexpensive place to train,” recalls an activist in the space. His rapid involvement in neighborhood life and the libertarian movement, as well as the chameleon-like aesthetic adaptation to which he gradually underwent, earned everyone’s trust. A huge star of chaos – a symbol associated with anarchism – tattooed on the knee, hoop earrings, combed hair and T-shirts with anti-fascist and anti-police messages served their purpose. From time to time, in a joking tone, they reminded him that when he had arrived certain people had distrusted him because little was known about his past in Palma. “He took it sportingly, with a smile, Dani has always been a joke”.
The Directa has been able to confirm the real identity behind Daniel Hernández Pons. He is an agent of the Spanish National Police Force with the initials DHP, which match those of the fake identity. Two of the methods of obtaining his real identity have been made possible by the mistakes made by the infiltrator, which have allowed access to open data about his past and present. The third is a physiognomic expert test that compares photographs from his time at the Ávila police school in the 2018-2019 biennium and from his image gallery as an activist in Barcelona. “It can be concluded without any kind of doubt that the photographs correspond to one and the same person”, reads the report of the expert after analyzing more than twenty facial and craniometric features of the individual.
By mid-autumn 2020, the infiltration of this second spy had been consolidated. Dani, who graduated on June 24, 2019 as a police officer – the stage to which the photograph that illustrates the cover of this publication corresponds – and who was sent on a secret mission to Barcelona, in everyone’s eyes he was already a new neighbor and another neighborhood activist. From the flat where he had settled, an attic on Carrer de la Flor de Neu – next to Avinguda de la Meridiana–, he walked two or three times a week to Plaça de les Palmeres, where he joined the people who made a beer while sitting on the benches chatting until well past midnight. In one of those evenings, when the night curfew resulting from the pandemic had already been decreed,
The young man, who defined himself as an anarchist, established a circle of friends with whom he moved around the neighborhood and traveled in groups throughout the city. A regular at parties, concerts and nighttime activities, he was often seen drinking alcohol and on multiple occasions would have consumed narcotic substances, as eyewitnesses have told Directa . Numerous communications via mobile messaging between the undercover police and neighborhood activists confirm this. “I feel instrumentalized, it is an abuse of power to coerce the freedom of all of us. These are the tools used by the State, this is our democracy”, replies Manu -pseudonym-, one of the neighbors of the neighborhood with whom he had also established a close friendship.
Active in the demonstrations against the imprisonment of Pablo Hasél in February 2021, he was one of the demonstrators encapsulated by the Mossos d’Esquadra in Carrer Gran de Gràcia during the protest on the 21st. He was also present in at least four evictions, in one of which he faced a squad of the extrajudicial eviction company Desokupa. On another occasion, on April 7, 2021, he participated in the resistance to an intervention by the Mossos d’Esquadra in Calle Llenguadoc and held hands with other activists at the door of the building after the arrival of the judicial entourage He was sanctioned by the riot police of the Mobile Brigade with a fine of 600 euros, in application of the gag law. He did not appeal the administrative penalty and, as he explained to those around him, he did not pay it. In its busy schedule of alternative leisure, the major festivals of Prosperitat, Poble-sec, Gràcia and Sants were not missing, as well as events in the self-managed and community spaces Can Masdeu, Can Batlló, Kasa de la Muntanya, l’Ateneu l’Harmonia and La Comunal (Barcelona), and lokomotiva (l’Hospitalet de Llobregat). And, at least, he was also present at one of the cuts of the Meridiana Resisteix platform and at a demonstration against the threat of eviction of the old Massana del Raval School.
One of it’s victims talked about the case. Clara is an anarchist militant, a member of La Cinètika and is linked to the world of scouting. He was the partner of the infiltrator Daniel Hernández Pons for a year.
Under what circumstances did you meet Daniel Hernández?
It was at the end of November 2020, in an assembly of La Cinètika to work on the guide for prevention and action against patriarchal violence. One of our first dates, in December 2020, coincided with a demonstration against a warehouse fire in the Gorg neighborhood of Badalona, where I remember he arrived with a Palestinian scarf. We got involved that day and it was an intense week, we saw each other every day.
What did he tell you about his life in Mallorca?
He showed me some photos from when he was a teenager and one of his supposed ex-partner. Now I think that starting to tattoo also normalized the character. One day he explained to me that his father was dead, that he had been a cocoon and that he still maintained a relationship with his paternal family, but his mother did not. For this reason, at Christmas I went to Granada and Mallorca, with both families.
Did he show his political positions?
We talked very little about politics and in the end he always proved me right. His general dynamic was to make jokes about everything and end up saying the same thing as me. Now I realize that at first he was not at all politicized, but I also think he learned from it.
How would you describe his character?
Outgoing, caring, very kind to everyone and willing to help. He was very nice and talkative. He won everyone’s trust easily and even he told me that people came to tell him “their dramas”. He took care of me a lot and was the type of guy you think doesn’t exist.
How was his leisure time and how did he behave?
When he was with me he went out partying less, he made more plans with me and my colleagues, he adapted. However, I went out partying with him and ended up pretty drunk. I don’t do drugs and he always told me that he didn’t do drugs much, but then they explained to me that he used a lot more than he said. One of his favorite shirts was one that said “MonoPoly,” which was a play on words with a monkey dressed as a police officer.
You traveled to Mallorca together. What do you remember about that trip?
I told him he had to show me Mallorca and I went there from August 6 to 9, 2021. He left for there a few days before and picked me up at the airport in a big and very net, which he said belonged to a relative. A supposed friend of his was leaving us a house in Montuïri and we met him at a bar for a mojito. Dani wanted me to meet his supposed mother on the outskirts of Palma, but I didn’t feel like it and I told him no. He got very angry.
Why did your relationship end?
On October 24, 2021, he asked me for a few days to think and the official break was on October 28. Our relationship grew always surrounded by his mistrust of the bond with my ex. He always told me that he “only loved me”, but that I didn’t love him enough and he made me feel very guilty.
How did the breakup affect you?
I stopped going to dinner parties at La Cinètika because I didn’t want to meet him. The whole neighborhood thought “poor Dani, he’s having a hard time because of Clara”. I pulled back a bit to respect his space and stopped going to the social center so I wouldn’t run into him. He stopped going to the assemblies, but continued to go to the dinners and became very involved in one of the film projects, which allowed him to have keys to the social center.
How did it affect you to find out that he is an undercover cop?
It has caused me a lot of fear and anxiety. Now, when I see a policeman I get very nervous, and it has also affected my confidence. I have felt very used, she has used us as women and as activists, and this makes me feel very disgusted and helpless. If he wanted to investigate us, which I think would be just as serious, there was no need for him to generate such intense relationships, he has done many things that were not necessary. It’s hard for me to understand that level of involvement in people’s lives and it reminds me of his insistence on being with me, his insistence that he loved me and wanted to be in a relationship. He actually got to meet my parents and my sister. If I had known he was a cop, I would never have had a relationship with him. I couldn’t decide. I get flashes of having introduced him in environments of great intimacy. Nothing justifies the State and the police interfering in my life. I feel like I’ve been raped, I’ve been with someone I now realize I didn’t know and it creates a lot of fear. What he has done to me as a woman is very strong, but I think it is just as serious that he has inserted himself into the lives of his friends or the political activities of spaces like La Cinètika. I feel shocked, but strong because we are managing this collectively.
