A day before starting to serve the six-month suspension for a very serious offense, Judge Rafael Lis again dismissed for the third time the case opened against Pedro de Armas for money laundering, again against the criteria of the Public Prosecutor's Office, which again appealed that decision. Now, as soon as he returns to the Court after serving his sanction, Lis has issued an order rejecting that appeal, although the Prosecutor's Office can still appeal once more before the Provincial Court of Las Palmas, which has already ordered Rafael Lis to reopen this case twice.
The judge's latest order dismissing the investigation into Pedro de Armas is dated on a Sunday, specifically April 29, 2018, on the eve of Lis having to leave the Court (it was May 1 when he began serving a sanction for having continued to instruct a case in which he had been challenged for having a direct or indirect interest in the procedure, since his wife worked as a lawyer for the businessman Juan Francisco Rosa). In addition, on that same Sunday, Lis also signed at least one other resolution, also against the criteria of the Prosecutor's Office, and initiated the procedure to bring to trial a case against the complainant in the Unión case, Carlos Espino, related to the territorial qualification for a gas station, despite the fact that the Public Prosecutor's Office had requested the dismissal.
Regarding the investigation into Pedro de Armas and his family, it began in 2012, following a report by the UDEF of the National Police. The agents of this unit had investigated the Yate case, for the massive granting of illegal licenses in Playa Blanca, and had repeatedly found the name of De Armas, who at that time was a party colleague and also shared businesses with the mayor of Yaiza, José Francisco Reyes, who granted him illegal licenses with which he earned hundreds of thousands of euros. This was highlighted by the police reports, which detailed the millionaire benefits obtained by Pedro de Armas buying and selling plots both in Playa Blanca and in Arrecife, where he was Councilor for Urban Planning, in addition to having been responsible for Gesplan.
An investigation under secrecy until Lis arrived at the Court
The Court of Instruction Number 3 of Arrecife then initiated an investigation under secrecy of summary, under the direction of two different judges who occupied that position and in coordination with the prosecutor Ignacio Stampa, who at that time was also responsible for the Yate case. However, in mid-2013 there was a new change of ownership in the Court, which became the responsibility of Rafael Lis. And as soon as he arrived, one of the first things he did in July of that year was to address the UDEF giving them 7 days to issue a report on this case.
Just after receiving it, on August 12, Lis issued an order lifting the secrecy of summary and another ordering the provisional dismissal of the case, against the criteria of the Police, the Prosecutor's Office and the two judges who had been in charge of the proceedings before. And also against the criteria of the Provincial Court, which has already ordered Judge Lis to reopen the case on two occasions, because not even all the necessary proceedings requested by the UDEF and the Public Prosecutor's Office had been carried out.
In its appeal against that first dismissal of the case, the Prosecutor's Office pointed out that there was "a huge number of indications of criminality" against Pedro de Armas, since among other things they had detected "the existence of 112 properties, 20 vehicles and 9 boats, as well as 66 current accounts", in addition to "donations" to his children worth almost 1.5 million euros. "The way in which such assets were acquired is unknown", the prosecutor pointed out, adding that the latest police report from the UDEF described facts that are "more than indicative of operations linked to money laundering". In addition, it was being investigated whether De Armas had diverted money to Argentina, where the politician and his family had "at least one company and two properties" of "more than 13,000 hectares", that is, 130 million square meters, without observing "outflows of capital abroad" from their accounts at the time of purchase.
The Court concluded that the judge's decision was not "in accordance with the law"
In September 2013, the Second Section of the Provincial Court upheld that appeal by the Prosecutor's Office, stating that Judge Lis's decision to dismiss the case was not "in accordance with the law", because there was documentation that had been requested and that had not even arrived yet, such as a rogatory commission to Argentina, and another that had arrived but that Lis's Court had not delivered to the police, so it was necessary to "transfer it", precisely so that the agents in charge of the investigation could analyze it.
In addition, the Court recalled all the data that the UDEF had put on the table, among other things with details of operations in which De Armas had "obtained significant economic benefits in a single day, of almost one million euros", buying and selling land that only obtained a license after passing through his hands. Later, those licenses were declared illegal and, in addition, the former mayor and two technicians from Yaiza have been convicted in criminal proceedings for having granted them knowing their illegality.
However, two years after the Court ordered him to reopen the case, Rafael Lis again dismissed it, specifically on November 23, 2015, insisting that he saw "no indication of the commission of criminal acts" and without even responding to the request from the UDEF and the Prosecutor's Office to request a new rogatory commission to Argentina, given that the results of the first had not even reflected the two properties and the company that Pedro de Armas himself had acknowledged owning in that country.
Three years without responding and dismissal just before leaving
That order was again appealed by the Prosecutor's Office, first before Lis's own Court, which rejected it, and then before the Provincial Court, which in December 2016 again upheld that appeal and ordered the case to be reopened again, stating that the request to request a new rogatory commission to Argentina should be resolved. However, once the proceedings were reopened, the judge continued without attending to or responding to that request, which was reiterated again by the Public Prosecutor's Office in May 2017, also without result.
Finally, a year and a half after the Court forced him to resume the case and to rule on that rogatory commission, and just before having to leave the Court to serve a suspension, what Lis did was to dismiss the procedure again. And in that order he finally responded to the request that he had had on the table for more than three years and to which the Court had ordered him to respond, and pointed out that it was "unnecessary" to carry out that test requested by the Prosecutor's Office and the UDEF. In addition, as he had already stated in his first order dismissing the case, he again insisted that this procedure "should never have been admitted", despite the fact that it had been endorsed by two previous investigating judges, by the Public Prosecutor's Office (with the different prosecutors who have been assigned to the case) and by the different sections of the Court that ordered the case to be reopened.
The Prosecutor's Office then appealed that order again, in the first instance before Lis's own Court of Instruction. And it was upon his return, when he rejoined the Court after serving his six-month suspension, that Lis himself resolved that appeal, with an order dated March 8. In it, he limits himself to citing different judgments to argue that a judge is not "obliged to admit all the means of evidence that each party deems pertinent". Thus, he confirms his own order dismissing the case, although his resolution can still be appealed again before the Provincial Court.
