VALENCIA, 18 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) –
Agents of the Central Operative Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard are simultaneously carrying out different searches at company headquarters in Madrid, Valencia and Castellón in the framework of the Azud case, as sources of the investigation have confirmed to Europa Press. At the moment no arrests.
The records, carried out by order of the Court of Instruction number 13 of Valencia and the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, have to do with one of the secret pieces of Azud, a procedure in which alleged ‘bites’ are investigated in exchange for public works awards from the City Council of the Valencian capital by winning companies that would have made supposedly fictitious invoices.
The records are being carried out with the aim of requiring different documentation from companies and, in addition, to take statements from different people.
It is a secret procedure related to crimes of prevarication, bribery and embezzlement and that has the support of Europol. Among the companies to which the UCO agents have been transferred is Acciona.
Among those investigated in Azud –around 60 people– are the former deputy mayor of Valencia with the PP and right-hand man of the deceased Rita Barberá, Alfonso Grau; the brother-in-law of the former mayor and lawyer, José María Corbín, and his family; the former socialist councilor and former sub-delegate of the Government, Rafael Rubio; and the former head of Divalterra’s legal services, José Luis Vera.
The case started in 2017 but it was not until two years later, in April 2019, that the first arrests were made: those of the lawyers José María Corbín and Diego Elum. In a second phase, in May of last year, the judge ordered the arrest of Grau, Rubio and Vera, all of them already free.
