In the first row, Pablo Crespo (left) and Francisco Correa, during the trial for the landing of the Gürtel plot in Boadilla. Javier Lizon (EFE)
The last and forceful blow of the National High Court to the PP resounded on Friday.
The court sentenced the popular for the third time for benefiting from the Gürtel plot: this time, for the line of investigation focused on the landing of Francisco Correa's companies in the Boadilla del Monte City Council (59,052 inhabitants, Madrid).
This recent sentence raises the number of those punished for their involvement in the corrupt network.
According to the count of EL PAÍS, the Spanish justice system has already handed down prison sentences for 81 people.
Among them, dozens of officials, advisers and relatives of the conservative political force, now chaired by Alberto Núñez Feijóo.
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The National Court condemns the PP for the third time for benefiting from the Gürtel plot
The popular accumulate, in this way, three failures against.
The resolution known on Friday forces them to pay 204,000 euros for using bribes from the plot to pay for electoral acts.
This amount is added to the penalties of 369,111.8 euros imposed in the two previous sentences: for the
Época I
trial , the main line of investigation and which ended with the conviction that caused the motion of censure against Mariano Rajoy in 2018;
and for paying with black money for the renovation of its headquarters on Génova Street.
New ex-charges from the PP are now added to the list of convicts.
Stands out, above all, Arturo González Panero, former mayor of Boadilla and known as
El Albondiguilla
, sentenced to 36 years in prison.
But others are added to the black list: Alfonso Bosch Tejedor,
El Bujías
and
El Neveras
, former deputy of the Madrid Assembly (4 years and 4 months in prison) and who mediated to organize the wedding of the daughter of former president José María Aznar with Alexander Agag;
Cesar Tomas Martin Morales,
The Saint
, former manager of the Municipal Land and Housing Company of the Madrid town (7 years and 3 months);
and the former popular councilor Juan Jesús Siguero.
The National Court also sentenced the builders José Luis Ulibarri and Gonzalo Naranjo to prison;
Carlos Jorge Martínez Massa, former president of L'Oréal in Spain;
and the businessmen Rodolfo Benigno and Javier del Valle.
All of them already integrate, therefore, the extensive judicial balance of Gürtel.
The Spanish courts have issued convictions for nine lines of investigation related to the plot, where the accumulated sentences exceed 600 years in prison.
Among those sentenced, in addition to those mentioned, are also Francisco Correa, ringleader of the network;
your
number two
and former secretary of the Organization of the popular Galicians, Pablo Crespo;
two former national treasurers of the PP, Luis Bárcenas and Ángel Sanchís;
Ricardo Costa, former general secretary of training in the Valencian Community;
José Ramón Blanco Balín, tax adviser to the corrupt network and former vice president of Repsol;
María Milagrosa Martínez, former president of the Valencian Courts;
and Alberto López Viejo, councilor of the Community of Madrid with Esperanza Aguirre.
The Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office hopes that this list will be further expanded.
The National Court has yet to hold another three trials for Gürtel and, in turn, the line of investigation focused on the alleged donations by businessmen to the PP's b-box in exchange for the award of public contracts is still under investigation, where the popular formation is also involved as a legal person.
As of today, these are the remaining oral hearings:
Valencian branch.
Francisco Camps, former president of the Generalitat Valenciana and former president of the regional PP, faces a request from the Prosecutor's Office for two and a half years in prison for prevarication and fraud for his alleged involvement in the irregular awards of the Generalitat to the Gürtel plot.
The former popular leader, who has offered himself to the party to return to the political front line, is the main defendant in a trial that will begin in January 2023, according to the calendar of the National Court.
He will be accompanied on the bench by another 27 defendants.
The former president of the Generalitat Valenciana Francisco Camps, in the vicinity of the old Formula 1 urban circuit in Valencia, in March. BIEL ALINO (EFE)
Arganda.
The Court also has pending the trial for the landing of the plot in Arganda del Rey (Madrid), where he gave one of his biggest hits: 25 million euros in commissions were distributed for the illegal sale of municipal plots after rigging the public tender.
Among the 21 defendants is the then mayor of the town, Ginés López (PP);
and the builder Fernando Martín, former president of Real Madrid.
Treasury and money laundering.
There is also no date yet for the trial on the corporate structure devised by Gürtel to launder money and avoid payments to the Treasury.
The court has run into an important problem: it is looking for a space to hold a macro-view, which will seat 26 individuals and 20 companies —as subsidiary civil managers— on the bench.
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