“I am very grateful for your involvement. An example of friendship that is not very common.”. That message, located by the UCO agents on Ignacio Calatayud's phone, has opened a new front in the judicial investigation against the former president of the Cabildo, Pedro San Ginés (CC), and against the lawyer.
The person who sent that Whatsapp to Calatayud was the wife of one of Inalsa's bankruptcy administrators, Pedro Martín, who is a key piece in this case. And it is that Martín has been supporting, both in public statements and in the Courts, the arguments of San Ginés and Ignacio Calatayud, defending the payments he received for the bankruptcy of the public water company. “He admires you a lot”, added Otilia Santana in that message, whom Calatayud had saved in his agenda as “Oti wife Pedro Martín”.
It should be remembered that Pedro Martín was already charged in this procedure, for alleged crimes of document forgery and procedural fraud, precisely for a report he signed on May 9, 2021, when Calatayud was trying to collect another 86,000 euros from Inalsa. Now, the analysis of the mobile phone seized from Ignacio Calatayud provides new elements that could shed light on his motivation and his alleged participation in the events. The bankruptcy administrator hid the existence of that relationship between his wife and Calatayud in the judicial statement he made before the Investigating Court last October 14.
“From what is observed in this chat, it is clear that there is a labor relationship between the wife of Pedro Carlos Martín Toledo, bankruptcy administration, and the person of Ignacio Calatayud Prats”, the UCO points out in one of its reports. In fact, the messages reflect much more than that labor relationship, since she herself speaks of “friendship”.
The UCO highlights the coincidence of the dates
The communications analyzed by the agents begin on April 21, 2021, when Pedro Martín's wife, Otilia Santana, wrote to Ignacio Calatayud to mediate with officials from the Cabildo of Gran Canaria, where she was trying to get a business linked to the Sports area off the ground. “At your disposal!”, responded Ignacio Calatayud.
Just three weeks later, on May 9, 2021, Otilia Santana's husband issued that report in which he endorsed Ignacio Calatayud's new claim for fees, which was later declared “improper” by the Justice. That claim ended up starting this criminal case, when the Water Consortium began to analyze all the payments that Calatayud had received under the mandate of San Ginés, and ended up filing a lawsuit.
The UCO agents themselves underline that temporal coincidence in their report, since while Calatayud was carrying out procedures in favor of Otilia Santana, her husband was issuing a ruling in his favor, addressed to the Court that was going to resolve the claim for fees. In addition, Pedro Martín has also defended that the lawyer kept the costs of all the previous bankruptcy incidents, in what the investigators consider to be an improper appropriation. And it is that contrary to what the former bankruptcy administrator maintains, they have not found documents that support that alleged agreement.
Investigated subsidies and attempt to recuse technicians
After that message of gratitude from Otilia Santana to Calatayud for his “involvement” and for his example of friendship”, Otilia Santana shared a press clipping from the newspaper La Provincia with him. “The Cabildo grants 65,000 euros to a tennis tournament that has been denounced”, said that headline published in August 2021.
The news appeared illustrated with a photograph of the Minister of Sports together with Otilia Santana herself, as director of the tournament. “A Court investigates the subsidies from the Island Sports Institute to three companies of the same person, at the request of officials from that organization”, added the subtitle.
Before obtaining that sum, Santana spoke to Calatayud about the need to recuse several technicians from the Cabildo. “The good thing is that it is in the hands of the director. The bad thing is that the Minister of Sports told me today that he is holding the signature. That the secretary of the Cabildo, Luis Manero, signed not to recuse the technicians. He told me that he also needed that meeting because the technicians are pressuring him to sign the non-recusal as well”, she wrote to him.
Next, she asked him to mediate with the secretary. “Let's see if you can convince Luis Manero and together with the director we can recuse them so that the legal advice resolves. I hope it is soon and the minister signs”, she added.
Later, she insisted asking if he had “been able to contact” that official. “No... the secretary in my time was another... but I will ask for the favor”, Calatayud replied, whom Santana later thanked for his efforts.
The last conversation collected by the UCO dates back to March 3, 2022, when Otilia Santana sent him another newspaper clipping, after other messages in which she complained about published information that was related to criminal cases. “Look what comes out in the press today (…) Anyway, we are in the hands of God and Justice”, she stated. “That's right!!! and it's getting worse!”, Calatayud replied.
It should be remembered that Ignacio Calatayud collected nearly two million euros in costs in favor of Inalsa in the bankruptcy proceedings, compared to the 196,000 euros that the magistrate Juan José Cobo Plana had budgeted, that is, more than ten times what had been budgeted by the who was the expert in the matter hired to carry out the bankruptcy until Pedro San Ginés dismissed him.
