In addition to uncovering new networks of alleged corruption, Operation "Jable" would demonstrate that after the first arrests on May 25, 2009, corruption did not disappear from the Lanzarote institutions. That is at least what emerges from the UCO investigation, which considers that the head of the Technical Office of Arrecife, Rafael Arrocha, continued to charge allegedly fraudulent invoices to the capital City Council after his first arrest more than a year ago, with which he would have continued to obtain alleged economic benefits.
Arrocha, who was arrested on May 25, 2009 in Operation "Unión", was later released, charged with "revealing information to which he has had access by reason of his position and privileged information." However, he regained his position at the head of the Technical Office, despite the fact that it is a position of free designation, and he was still head of this department when he was arrested again last April within the framework of Operation "Jable".
And the most significant thing is that the new facts that are now imputed to him are not only related to what happened in previous years, but also in recent months after his arrest, in which supposedly, and always according to the investigation, he continued to carry out allegedly criminal activities from the administration.
Something that clashes with the criterion maintained by the Provincial Court in the order with which it ordered the release of councilor Antonio Machín, in which the danger of recidivism is even ruled out as an argument to maintain provisional detention. "In view of the media impact that this procedure has had on the island of Lanzarote, it does not seem that it would occur to the accused to ask for or accept, nor to a businessman to offer or pay any commission, so it is not considered that there is fear that the accused will commit this crime of bribery again," the order states, contrary to what the UCO investigation maintains, at least with respect to Rafael Arrocha.
Bribery and other crimes
As a result of his second arrest, Arrocha was also charged with alleged crimes of bribery, in addition to others related to his activity as a public official, and Judge César Romero Pamparacuatro decreed provisional imprisonment for him. Of the four people for whom this measure was adopted after the arrests of Operation "Jable", only Rafael Arrocha remains in prison, specifically in the Gran Canaria prison of Salto del Negro.
While in the first phase of Operation "Unión" he was charged with having participated in the alleged fixing of the award of the Arrecife General Plan, now he is also accused of having received alleged bribes in exchange for actions derived from his public function. Contracts, invoices and almost all the issues of the City Council that depended on a technical supervision passed through his hands. Among other things, he was in charge of annually endorsing the percentage in which the amount that the City Council pays to Urbaser was going to increase, under the contract signed in the times of María Isabel Déniz.
In addition, Rafael Arrocha shared a private company (Gamma 3) with two other defendants, Julio Romero and Manuel Spínola, who allegedly issued invoices under suspicion to the Arrecife City Council.
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