A scheme that involved civil guards from different parts of Spain, including one who was stationed in Lanzarote, already has a final sentence, after resolving the appeal of one of the agents against the first ruling.
In total, in the case there were more than 20 defendants, for participating in a plot to collect compensation fraudulently, for an alleged moving service that they did not actually use.
In the trial, almost all the agents involved confessed to the crimes of fraud and document forgery, accepting only fines of 910 euros and suspension of employment or public office for three months and one day.
In the case of the civil guard who was stationed in the Puerto del Carmen barracks, before the hearing he returned the defrauded money, which in his case amounted to 7,614 euros. That was the amount he received in 2013, when he moved from the Puerto del Carmen barracks to another in Barcelona, and presented a false invoice from a moving company to access that compensation.
He never hired the service, but of that amount he gave 1,505 euros to the people who mediated so that he could access that sum, according to what he confessed in the trial.
Agents who moved between the Canary Islands and the Peninsula
Of the rest of the agents involved, most also faced transfers between the Peninsula and the Canary Islands, although the plot began in Navarra, where the investigation began and the first instance ruling was issued.
That sentence considered it proven that an agent stationed in Pamplona was the one who "devised, together with his wife, a plot through which both, acting with the aim of illicit enrichment, took care of processing the applications for compensation for transfer of residence (ITR)", after agreeing with another of the accused, who was the owner of the company Transportes y Mudanzas Carjusan.
To collect that compensation, the agents who face a transfer and who require that service must present three different budgets, and the Civil Guard pays them the amount of the lowest, "so that this financial aid is used to pay for the officially approved move."
In this case, the agent from Pamplona contacted others who were going to change residence and "took care of processing all the necessary documentation for the perception of the Compensation for Transfer of Residence." Thus, according to the sentence, Carjusan "offered the lowest budget of the three that accompanied the application, which was possible thanks to the prior knowledge they had of the other two offers presented."
Once that company was awarded the transport, the civil guard requesting the aid "profited from all or most of the ITR - which in certain cases could amount to about 9,000 euros - and, at the same time", the guard who acted as an intermediary, his wife and the businessman "charged a sum of money that was paid to them by the civil guard beneficiary of the ITR, either in cash or by means of a bank transfer, without the company Transportes y Mudanzas Carjusan ever carrying out the move."
For that intermediation, they received between 937 and 1,836 euros from the agent who collected the fraudulent compensation.
Confessions, reductions in sentences and an agent who appealed
The agents who confessed and accepted the sentence were applied as mitigating factors the late confession and the reparation of the damage, for having returned the money. As for another who did not confess, and who was also convicted, he appealed the ruling and the Supreme Court has now upheld his appeal, although only partially, in relation to the money he will have to return as civil liability.
Specifically, it establishes that although in his case there is also no record of "the transfer of belongings and furniture", which is what he unduly charged, he was able to prove that he paid for the transfer of his vehicle. Thus, the new sentence concludes that 1,302 euros, corresponding to the invoice for the transfer of the car, will be deducted from the figure to be returned.