The lawyer of the Arrecife City Council in the last trial of the Montecarlo Case has resigned from continuing to lead the legal direction as a private prosecution, "due to the disagreements with the way the defense is being conducted in the present procedure and therefore due to the lack of the due trust that must preside over the lawyer-client relationship," as communicated to the First Section of the Provincial Court.
In addition, he requests "in order not to cause defenselessness to said party, the Provincial Court should, after suspending the procedure, require the municipal corporation to appoint another lawyer to intervene on its behalf in this procedure within the period to be determined".
As will be recalled, this trial was to have begun on January 30, but the indefinite strike by the lawyers of the Administration of Justice has suspended it on two occasions and the trial will predictably have to be postponed until the end of the year or the beginning of 2024.
Allegedly illegal payments
This last piece of the Montecarlo case investigates allegedly illegal payments for services not provided to the company Tunera Producciones. Eleven people will be in the dock, for alleged crimes of embezzlement of public funds, fraud against the administration, administrative prevarication and document forgery.
For all of them, the Prosecutor's Office requests, according to the indictment to which this newspaper has had access, between three and six years in prison, the payment of fines and the possible return to the City Council of the money allegedly looted from the public coffers of the capital.
Among the accused is José Montelongo (PSOE), former mayor of Arrecife and Councilor of Finance at the time of the events. Together with him, the former auditor of Arrecife, Carlos Sáenz, will be in the dock.
The rest of the accused are former councilors Eduardo Lasso (PIL), Isabel Martinón (PNL), Víctor Sanginés (PSOE) and former councilor Lorenzo Lemaur (PP), the businessman and owner of Tunera Producciones Eduardo Ferrer and several City Council workers: José Nieves Caraballo, Miguel Ángel Leal, Blas Antonio Cedrés and Francisco Hernández Betancort.
