Lorenzo Martínez, Councilor for Security in Benidorm (Alicante).
The Councilor for Security of Benidorm, Lorenzo Martínez Sola (PP), has been freed from charges after the provisional dismissal of the case that investigated his alleged participation in a money laundering and influence peddling network linked to Russian mafias.
The judge of the Court of Instruction 1 of Benidorm has ruled that "there is no evidence nor have they appreciated facts that constitute a crime," says her lawyer, Francisco González.
The mayor of Benidorm has not left office since he was arrested and released in 2020.
More than a year after the operation in which the mayor was arrested, Martínez Sola went to testify before the judge "two weeks ago," says his lawyer.
The suspicions of the investigation were centered on the friendship of the councilor with the alleged ringleader of the plot, Alexei Sirokov, and on certain telephone conversations established between the two and which were intervened by the police.
“It has become clear”, González continues, “that my client knew Sirokov”, because, among other things, he “was also a member of the party”.
But from his punctured talks, "no crime can be interpreted," says the lawyer, "or influence peddling or anything."
González explains that the provisional dismissal will be firm if three days elapse without anyone, neither the Public Prosecutor's Office nor the private prosecution, brought by the PSOE, appealing it.
Martínez Sola's defense assesses the possibility of appealing the order in search of an improvement of the resolution, the free dismissal.
Martínez Sola's arrest took place in December 2020, within the framework of Operation Testudo, coordinated by the National Police, against money laundering and influence peddling.
Along with him, 22 more people were arrested, most of Russian origin, but also a policeman, two civil guards, municipal officials and Spanish lawyers.
The mayor of Benidorm Security shared research with his counterpart in Altea, Jaime Sellés (PP), who then no longer held any position in the Altea government.
All were released after giving evidence, except for Sirokov, and three of his top lieutenants.
According to police sources after the development of the operation, Sirokov was a Russian lawyer based in Altea who, allegedly, facilitated the arrival of money from Russian mafias, from arms or drug trafficking, from the forced privatization of public companies and strategic sectors of the former Soviet Union and extortion, to companies in the leisure and construction sectors based in the province of Alicante and Ibiza.
The police operation, whose investigation lasted seven years, concluded with 23 arrests and 18 searches in different homes, in which the agents found 300,000 euros in cash in safe deposit boxes, one million in one of the blocked accounts, six weapons short fire rifles, two combat shotguns, an assault rifle,