Elvira Fernández-Almoguera
Elvira Fernández-Almoguera Casas
First woman prosecutor in Spain
Herencia, 1907 - Albacete, 1938
Elvira Fernández-Almoguera Casas is a pioneering woman with a legal career in an overly short life. From her village in La Mancha, she moved to Albacete to pursue her baccalaureate at ‘Bachiller Sabuco’ school in 1923, where she earned her baccalaureate in 1924 and then furthered her education at the university.
Fernández-Almoguera enrolled in two different degree programmes, one in the sciences and the other in the humanities. She only finished her Law studies, but her enrolment in traditionally opposing fields shows her passion for broad learning and her zeal to be comprehensively educated. She completed her Law degree between Murcia and Madrid in 1928.
While studying at the university in Madrid, she was enriched by staying at the Ladies’ Residence, which advocated university education for women in Spain and encouraged them to join the working world. Without a doubt, living at the Residence with some of the most prominent women in the era must have even further shaped her as the independent, pioneering woman that she was.
In 1929, she returned to Albacete and joined the Bar Association in the capital, the first woman to do so (the second followed her in 1970). Her office was located on Pasaje de Lodares in a gem of an Art Nouveau building which even today seems frozen in that period. She joined the rotation of lawyers working for the poor on criminal matters for crimes with sentences of less than six years, as well as for civil matters.
In the months leading up to the Civil War, she was appointed president of the ‘Socorro Rojo Internacional’ in Albacete and interim director of the maternity ward of the Hermanas de la Caridad in the same city. She was a member of the Unión Republicana (Republican Union) and travelled around the province participating in rallies drumming up votes for the Frente Popular (Popular Front).
The war also altered her career, and due to the pressing needs in the profession, she was appointed interim prosecutor by the Ministry of Justice, becoming the first woman to legally and organically occupy a post in the Public Prosecution Service. That is, she was the first female prosecutor. In 1937 she worked as such in the People’s Court (Tribunal Popular) of Granada, located in Baza, and later, in January 1938 the Attorney General’s Office of the Republic suggested that she be transferred to the Regional Court of Albacete. Shortly thereafter, in August of that same year, she died at home from a severe heart condition.
She was a pioneering woman jurist in a difficult time whom we are rescuing from oblivion today by recognising her value as she deserves.
María Mercerdes Serrano Pérez
Associate Professor of Constitutional Law
Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha
References:
- Vázquez Osuna, Federico (2009). Las primeras mujeres juezas y fiscales españolas (1931-1939) Las juristas pioneras. Arenal: Revista de historia de las mujeres, v. 16, 1,133-150: https://doi.org/10.30827/arenal.v16i1.1491
Yanes Pérez, José Santiago (2020). Superando la prohibición. Mujer abogacía y otras carreras jurídicas en España. Santa Cruz de Tenerife: Oristán.
- Yanes Pérez, José Santiago (2020). Mujer y abogacía en las fuentes literarias españolas (1921-1967). Revista del Ilustre Colegio de Abogados de Santa Cruz de Tenerife, 33, 51-54.
- Videos:
-- Lanzadigital. Elvira Fernández-Almoguera Casas, primera mujer fiscal de la historia, 10.03.2019. En: https://youtu.be/s6sBr99tgsQ (accessed 20.09.2022).
-- Centro de Estudios de Castilla-La Mancha. Elvira, una ciudadrealeña pionera, 11.03.2019. A: https://youtu.be/hX3Rx9baYKY (accessed 20.09.2022).
Suggested citation:
Serrano Pérez, María Mercedes (2022). Elvira Fernández-Almoguera Casas. Pioneering Female Jurists: Remembrance and Memory [Electronic resource], Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, November 2022. In: https://ddd.uab.cat/record/268736
This web Pioneering Female Jurists: Remembrance and Memory was created as part of the teaching innovation and quality improvement project of the UAB 2021 (GI515402). Main researcher: María Jesús García Morales
