The judge requires the former vice mayor of Valencia to provide a bail of 2.2 million for possible financial liabilities
VALENCIA, 20 Jan. (EUROPA PRESS) –
The magistrate of the Investigating Court number 18 of Valencia has agreed to the opening of an oral trial for four people for piece A of the so-called ‘Taula case’ related to an alleged illegal financing of the ‘popular’ municipal group in the stage of Rita Barberá as mayoress .
In this way, the former deputy mayor of the city and in his day Barberá’s right-hand man, Alfonso Grau, will finally sit in the dock; the former secretary of the PP in the City Council Mari Carmen García Fuster; the former director of the Valencia Tourism Foundation, José Salinas, and the former director and former head of the Center for Strategies and Development (CEyD), Juan Eduardo Santón.
In a resolution provided by the Superior Court of Justice of the Valencian Community, the judge points to the Court as the body to prosecute the four defendants for the crimes of embezzlement of articles 432.1 and 74 of the Penal Code in the case of Grau, Santón and Salinas; and for bribery both for Grau (article 420 and 74) and for García Fuster (article 422 and 74).
In terms of civil liability, the judge requires Grau a bond of 2.2 million euros to answer for possible pecuniary responsibilities that could be declared; and 1.5 million to Salinas and 850,000 to Santón, which must be provided within 24 hours. In the case of the latter two, under warning of embargo.
The instructor gives ten days to the defenses to present their defense briefs against the accusations made. The Anti-Corruption Prosecutor requested in its provisional qualifications brief up to 15 years in prison for Grau, seven for García Fuster and five for Santón and Salinas. That figure included the years in prison for a crime of money laundering, which is ultimately not contemplated.
What was known as the ‘case of the smurfing’ thus faces its final stretch before the trial, after a long judicial journey in which the instructor came to issue an indictment of the PP and fifty people (49) including councilors and advisers of the ‘popular’ municipal group in the City Hall of the capital during Barberá’s time as mayoress, for a crime of money laundering in the 2015 municipal elections.
However, the Provincial Court was admitting the appeals of the defendants –including the party– and decreeing the dismissal of the proceedings for all of them –with the exception of the four who will finally sit on the bench for the crimes indicated– and the Supreme Court, for its part, dismissed the complaint appeals against the files agreed by the provincial body.
In the case of Grau, he maintained his prosecution and the order of the instructor, which attributed him a role of “collector” of money for the PP in the 2007 and 2011 elections. The instructor maintains that José Salinas and Juan Eduardo Santón could have been collaborators of embezzlement by agreeing to contracts, through the foundations they ran, “of vague benefit content and a significant burden, without a sufficient explanation in defense of it.”
Regarding García Fuster, she will be tried for bribery in the 2011 elections. In this case, the Court ordered to continue the case against her for the “alleged collection of money of unknown origin but nevertheless linked to collections from companies for work not proven or carried out at extra cost” in the 2011 electoral campaign.
