Rubén Eladio López, from Internal Affairs, says that they began to follow Gómez Iglesias by order of the Presidency and the Interior
MADRID, 25 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Several police officers have supported this Tuesday, in the trial held at the Provincial Court of Madrid, the thesis of the Prosecutor’s Office that Francisco Nicolás Gómez Iglesias, known as ‘Little Nicolás’, posed as a member of the Government to trying to defraud the businessman Javier Martínez de la Hidalga in the sale of a farm located in Toledo called ‘La Alamedilla’.
Rubén Eladio López, the then head of Group 9 of the Internal Affairs Unit of the Police, was the first to appear and assured that they began to follow Gómez Iglesias by order of the Presidency of the Government and the Secretary of State for Security of the Ministry of the Interior. “(Marcelino) Martín Blas (the then head of Internal Affairs) entrusted it to me,” he said.
In their initial accusation briefs, the State Prosecutor’s Office and the State Attorney’s Office asked for ‘Little Nicolás’ a sentence of 6 years in prison for alleged crimes of fraud, false documentation and usurpation of public functions. The prosecutor also requested special disqualification for passive suffrage and a fine of 18,000 euros. The popular accusation of Podemos, for its part, demanded 12 years in prison.
Tuesday’s trial began with the statements of the police because the defense has asked the court to allow Francisco Nicolás to testify at the end of the trial – and not at the beginning, as planned. The Prosecutor’s Office, the State Attorney’s Office and the popular accusation exercised by Podemos have not opposed Gómez Iglesias declaring at the end. The court, finally, has said that it has no objection to him appearing in tomorrow’s session.
According to the Public Ministry, in 2014 Gómez Iglesias contacted businessman Javier Martínez de la Hidalga, who was interested in selling the ‘La Alamedilla’ farm. The Prosecutor’s Office maintains that the defendant, in his strategy to make the businessman believe that he was acting on behalf of the Government, rented high-end black vehicles with a driver, and took a police-type flashlight to place it in said vehicles. .
In addition, the prosecutor assures that Gómez Iglesias prepared several “mendacious” official documents from the Presidency of the Government of Spain, the Royal House and the CNI, among others, in which the shields of Spain and those institutions appear, as well as other logos and anagrams own official documents, all of them obtained on the Internet.
This Tuesday, the agents have narrated how they went to the copy shop where they saw Gómez Iglesias with the documents he had on government letterhead, how they followed him when he met Martínez de la Hidalga and how they arrested him on October 14, 2014 .
The policemen questioned have stressed that at that time Francisco Nicolás did not have a driving license and that he even rented several high-end vehicles with a driver and tinted windows. “They jumped the traffic lights on some occasion,” said one of the agents.
According to the police, during the follow-ups carried out before the arrest, they verified that the accused had documentation with stickers from the Presidency of the Government, but they had to wait for him to hand it over to a third party; in this case, Martínez de la Hidalga.
Once Francisco Nicolás delivered the papers with the Executive’s letterhead, they proceeded to notify the businessman that he could be being scammed. Rubén Eladio López has assured that Martínez de la Hidalga told the police that he knew it was a scam, something that the Internal Affairs agent considers “already a complaint” in itself. Gómez Iglesias, however, has always defended that there was no fraud because he returned the money that the businessman had given him.
In the context of the trial, a worker from the bank office to which Gómez Iglesias and Martínez de la Hidalga went to withdraw money also testified as a witness. According to the Prosecutor’s Office, both tried to get hold of half a million euros that the businessman had with his wife in the bank.
The man has recounted how they asked him for the cash and how he explained to them that it was not possible to have the amount they required immediately, although he has indicated that in the end they did leave with money. “I don’t remember how much,” he said. According to the investigations, it would have been about 25,000 euros that ended up in the hands of ‘Little Nicolás’, although he later returned the money to the businessman.
The witness has assured that he does not remember if Francisco Nicolás said or not that he was a member of the Government. He has indicated, however, that he saw the young man make a phone call in which he asked about Soraya. “But I don’t know if she was Soraya Sáez de Santamaría,” he added.
When asked about the accusations, the bank worker specified that Martínez de la Hidalga himself was the one who introduced him to Gómez Iglesias “as someone from the government.”
As he has related, he thinks he remembers that ‘Little Nicolás’, when trying to open a bank account to transfer the businessman’s money, told him that he did not have a payroll and that he was a “CNI agent”. The man has stressed that when he reviewed his ID, his age caught his attention. “He was very young”, he has said, while pointing out that he suspected the operation because, in his opinion, it could be a scam or a kind of “disguised donation”.
The witness has assured that although he did not inform the Police, he did notify the security team so that they alerted the businessman.
Legal sources have indicated to Europa Press that three of the witnesses summoned to the trial on Tuesday have not attended the Madrid Provincial Court. Among those absent are Martínez de la Hidalga himself and his wife. The court will have to decide whether to suspend the hearing or continue without their statements.