The Criminal Court number 3 of Arrecife has sentenced Antonio Curbelo Robayna, a businessman close to Juan Francisco Rosa, for a crime "of special importance" against the Public Treasury, for defrauding a total of 840,193.08 euros. Curbelo has been sentenced, with the mitigating circumstance of undue delays, to one year and six months in prison and a fine amounting to the defrauded amount. In the event of non-payment, he must face another 30 days in prison.
In addition, he may not obtain public subsidies or aid, nor enjoy benefits or incentives from Social Security for three years. He must also pay court costs. In addition, he must compensate the Treasury, together with the company Playa Blanca 6 SL, of which he was the administrator, with another 840 thousand euros. The total amount that the businessman must disburse is close to 1.7 million euros between the fine and the compensation. The resolution, which is not final, can be appealed before the Provincial Court of Las Palmas.
The events date back to 2006, when Antonio Curbelo, as de facto and de jure administrator of the company Playa Blanca 6 SL, availed himself of the tax benefit of the Canary Islands Investment Reserve (RIC), for a value of 2.28 million euros. The Chamber emphasizes that, despite the fact that Curbelo "was perfectly aware" that the company had the obligation to make investments to comply with the tax incentive, in the following four fiscal years he did not make any investment and in 2010 he abandoned his activity.
Curbelo argued in the oral trial that the investment was never made because they wanted to make a new real estate development, which could not be. The judicial ruling states that, despite the fact that Curbelo Robayna was the legal administrator of Playa Blanca 6 SL until 2008, together with another deceased partner, he continued to be so de facto after that date, signing annual accounts and other company documents after his resignation.
The sentence to which La Voz has had access reveals that "all the elements concur" to qualify the facts as a crime against the Public Treasury. To which he adds "the special importance and seriousness of the fraud" because the amount defrauded exceeds 600,000 euros.
The ruling exposes "the inactivity" of the company Playa Blanca SL, where in 2010 no expenses or income were declared, nor were annual accounts or corporate tax filed, and that it also had no workers registered with Social Security, nor movements in bank accounts. In this line, the Court highlights "the breach of accounting and registration obligations".
It should be noted that the Chamber did not give "any credibility" to the testimony of Juan Francisco Rosa in the trial, as a witness, who claimed to have a friendship of more than 30 years with Antonio Curbelo.
At this point, Rosa blamed another partner for being "a disaster" as an administrator and that Antonio Curbelo "could not take the documentation to the tax advisor because the partner left the documentation in the vehicle for days without signing." These statements by Rosa had the opposite effect. The Court reveals that Rosa's intervention helped the Chamber to further strengthen the conviction that the accused was the administrator of the company and had "de facto control over it", in addition to acting with "intent" in the breach of the investments.
The businessman who tried to close the CACT and the wineries of La Geria
Antonio Curbelo, against the company Playa Blanca 5 SL, was one of the businessmen who tried to close the Tourist Centers in 2009, as revenge after the construction of 400 homes and another 1,400 promoted by him and other businessmen on land "that did not exist" in Playa Blanca were cautiously paralyzed.
In addition, he himself asked the Cabildo of Lanzarote to close "all the wineries of La Geria" after the court ordered the closure of the Stratvs winery, owned by Juan Francisco Rosa, due to the "high degree of contamination" in the treatment of wastewater and while this winery was being judicially investigated in the Stratvs case for irregularities in its construction and the alleged commission of various crimes against the environment.
