This action was controversial because the offenses were nearly 70 years old, occurring before the concept of crimes against humanity, and a 1977 general amnesty act barred any investigations related to criminal offenses with a political aim previous to 1976. In 2008, the inquiry was suspended. In September 2009, a trade union called "Manos limpias" (Clean Hands) filed a lawsuit against Garzón alleging that Garzón had abused his judicial authority by opening the inquiry. Manos Limpias is a "far-right group," according to The New York Times. Garzón denied any wrongdoing. In April 2010, Garzón was indicted by the Spanish Supreme Court for prevarication for arbitrarily changing his juridical criteria to engineer the case in order to bypass the law limiting his jurisdiction. If convicted, he could have been barred from his duties for 20 years. Garzón's indictment has been highly divisive within Spain and controversial abroad. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch condemned the indictment, and The New York Times published an editorial supporting him, whereas The Wall Street Journal condemned Garzón's proceedings in an editorial supporting the rule of law. There were public protests in Spain from left wing organizations supporting Garzón. The International Commission of Jurists considers that his short-lived inquiry did not justify disciplinary action, let alone criminal prosecution, adding that the prosecution of judges for carrying out their professional work was "an inappropriate and unwarranted interference with the independence of the judicial process". On 24 April 2010, Garzón presented an appeal to the Supreme Court against the judge investigating the case, Luciano Varela for giving advice to the plaintiffs about the errors in their documents. Garzón accused the judge of partiality, in having "a direct interest in the proceedings and bias in the action" and having "worked closely with the plaintiffs by offering counsel or legal advice" intended help the complainants to correct a defect in their series of indictments to meet a deadline, an action which he defined as "atypical, extrajudicial and prejudicial to one of the parties" (i.e. him, as the accused). According to Garzón, "intervention by the instructing judge is not protected under any provision of the current legal procedural rules and is clearly unrelated to the substantive rules of Spanish court procedure". Luciano Varela accepted the appeal and temporarily stepped out from the case until the Supreme Court rules on the appeal. On 11 May 2010, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, chief prosecutor of the