The Prosecutor's Office 'forgives' the entry into prison of the former councilor who uncovered the 'Gürtel case'

The former councilor of the PP of Majadahonda and complainant of the Gürtel plot, José Luis Peñas, in an image from October 2019.ULY MARTÍN

The Anticorruption Prosecutor's Office has presented this Tuesday in the National Court a letter in which it asks for the immediate entry into prison of 11 of the 12 sentenced to three years or more in prison for the first stage of the Gürtel plot of corruption who are still at large , after the Supreme Court made the sentences final last week.

Anti-corruption leaves out the former councilman of Majadahonda José Luis Penas, sentenced to four years and nine months in prison, whose recordings allowed to uncover the corruption network.

Already in 2018 the Prosecutor's Office announced that it would support a petition for clemency for him.

Of the 29 convicted, six are already in prison for this or other causes, among them the former treasurer of the PP Luis Bárcenas and the leaders of the plot, Francisco Correa and Pablo Crespo, and the former Madrid councilor Alberto López Viejo.

In addition, a seventh person, Isabel Jordán, was serving the sentence that had been imposed on her in another piece of the Gürtel case in third degree or semi-release.

Prison sources point out that with the new sentence of 14 years and 11 months this situation will be reviewed and, foreseeably, this prison benefit will be lost.

She is, in fact, one of the 11 people for whom Anti-Corruption is now calling for her immediate incarceration.

The other 10 convicted persons for whom Anti-Corruption requests to be admitted to prison are the wife of Luis Bárcenas, Rosalía Iglesias (12 years and 11 months in prison);

that of Correa, Carmen Rodríguez Quijano (17 years and 8 months);

the former councilman of Majadahonda Juan José Moreno (17 years and two months);

the former mayor of Pozuelo Jesús Sepúlveda (14 years and 4 months);

the former accountant for Correa's business network, José Luis Izquierdo (13 years and six months);

the former deputy councilor of the Community of Madrid Carlos Clemente (7 years and 9 months);

the former councilman in Estepona Ricardo Galeote (six years and six months);

Antonio Villaverde (3 years and 11 months);

former MP Jesús Merino (three years and 7 months), and Pedro Rodríguez Pendas (three years).

In a press release, the Prosecutor's Office also assured that it was going to request the imprisonment of López Viejo's wife Teresa Gabarra Balsells (one year and six months) and the financial advisor Iván Yáñez Velasco (one year and 10 months), but sources from the The institution confirmed to EL PAÍS that it was an error.

Of the 11 people for whom Anti-Corruption requests to be admitted to prison, at least two of them, Sepúlveda and Galeote, have presented in recent days two separate documents at the National Court requesting that their entry into prison be delayed between 10 and 15 days "with the object of leaving organized some matters of a family nature ", as detailed by Galeote.

The former councilman of Estepona has even detailed that his intention is to enter the prison of Alhaurín (Malaga) due to the proximity to his home.

Those who are already in prison are Bárcenas (whom the Supreme Court has sentenced to 29 years and one month in prison), López Viejo (27 years and ten months), the former mayor of Majadahonda Guillermo Ortega (40 years and 3 months), Francisco Correa (51 years old), his

Pablo Crespo (36 years and 8 months) and the financial mastermind Luis de Miguel (9 years and one month).