The Public Prosecutor's Office has opposed the request of the owners of Marina Rubicón, who on April 4 requested to appear in the Yate case and announced an appeal against the sentence, which, among other things, declared this marina illegal. In his response to this request, prosecutor Javier Ródenas questions that the company is trying to "frustrate" the execution of the ruling, which is already final and is in the execution phase, now intending to "become the third party in good faith affected by a judicial decision in which they have not been given the opportunity to defend themselves."
In this regard, the Prosecutor's Office emphasizes that the owners of Marina Rubicón not only knew about this procedure initiated more than 12 years ago, but were even charged in the case. Therefore, it considers that alleging now a supposed "defenselessness" is to "artificially construct a rhetorical mechanism that allows equating the third party in good faith with the investigated in a criminal procedure."
Furthermore, it adds that the fact that the proceedings for bribery crimes against Rafael Lasso, who requested the license, and against his two partners, Juan Francisco Rosa and Francisco Armas, were finally dismissed, "does not attribute the procedural status of third party in good faith." "It is clear that he has had knowledge and has even been a protagonist in the criminal process," the writing insists, which among other things recalls that Lasso even testified as an investigated party.
The sentence has already been notified to the City Council
Therefore, the Prosecutor's Office concludes that "their rights have not been violated" and that the property of Marina Rubicón had "the opportunity to defend itself" at the time, and asks that its request to enter now into a case that is already closed and with a final judgment be rejected. In fact, the Provincial Court has already ordered the imprisonment of two of the convicted and also has transferred the ruling to the Yaiza City Council, so that it is aware of the licenses that have been annulled with this sentence, among which is that of the port, for "the effects" that may proceed.
In its writing, the Prosecutor's Office also recalls the facts that were declared proven in the Yate sentence in relation to Marina Rubicón, in which, among others, the former mayor of Yaiza, José Francisco Reyes, and the former secretary, Vicente Bartolomé Fuentes, were convicted of crimes of prevarication in the granting of this and other permits. In addition, both defendants acknowledged the facts and accepted an agreement of conformity with the Prosecutor's Office, after confessing that they granted this permit knowing its illegality. In the case of Reyes, he even admitted to having received a bribe from the owners of the port, who left him a free mooring for years for the boat El Pachi, in exchange for granting them both this license and those of the illegal hotels that these same businessmen have in Playa Blanca.
Similarly, the Prosecutor's Office recalls that Reyes granted that license only a few days after it was requested and when the works had already been underway for more than two and a half years without having any type of permit. And all this despite the fact that Marina Rubicón had no legal coverage in the planning. Neither was a port planned there in the General Plan of Yaiza, nor did the Island Plan contemplate it, nor was a Special Plan made to cover an infrastructure that would have to be classified as a general system. Furthermore, according to what Apmun confirmed during the investigation of this case, the port also violated the Coasts Law, because the plot is located in an area of public maritime-terrestrial domain.
The port license, "manifestly illegal"
"The person who initiated the administrative procedure for granting the urban planning license has been a party and had the opportunity to express whatever he deemed appropriate to his claim," the prosecutor points out in reference to Rafael Lasso. "It is not a beneficiary alien to the criminal procedure who knew nothing about the procedure for obtaining the annulled urban planning license", he adds, reiterating that Lasso already testified within that case long before the investigation was closed and it went to trial.
In addition, the Public Prosecutor's Office defends that the "necessary consequence of the criminal conduct that is included in the Yate ruling" implies as a "necessary consequence" the annulment of the licenses that Reyes himself acknowledged having granted in exchange for bribes. "It is an act vitiated by radical nullity for being the origin of a criminal act, such as the urban planning prevarication recognized by the mayor of Yaiza, the convicted Jose Francisco Reyes Rodríguez," he points out, adding that in this case "there is no doubt that it is a manifestly illegal administrative act for having grossly departed from administrative legality and that the Court must consequently declare it null."