Juan Francisco Rosa has once again addressed the Provincial Court of Las Palmas asking for the precautionary measure that ordered the closure of the Stratvs winery in December 2013 to be lifted, within the criminal case that is already pending trial. In his new writing, Rosa's defense insists on denying that polluting spills occurred, despite the reports that accredit it, and on ensuring that there is no water network in the area, so according to him there is no "risk of contaminating waters that do not exist".
In addition to alluding to new private reports provided by his defense, his request also refers to the Special Plan of La Geria, definitively approved two years ago, alleging that it "legalizes" the facilities. In this regard, Rosa stresses that this Plan expressly mentions the Stratvs winery and classifies it as a structuring equipment, thus giving it the same category as the nine historical wineries of La Geria. "This fact is of capital importance since, even in the event that it can be concluded that the licenses granted for the construction of the complex and the activity of the winery were not adjusted at the time to the legal system, it is irrefutable that said facilities have been legalized or, at least, are legalizable and therefore atypical, since the approval of said Special Plan", argues his defense.
For its part, the popular accusation, represented by Urban Transparency, believes that this new request from Rosa to reopen the winery is based precisely on the imminent risk that this Plan will be annulled, since the Superior Court of Justice of the Canary Islands has already met to issue its ruling on the contentious appeals that were filed against the document, and the sentence is pending to be issued. "Mr. Rosa knows that, despite his strenuous effort to discredit the judicial experts Mrs. Joanna Macías and Mr. Leopoldo Díaz, there are sufficient grounds to fear that said plan will decay due to the nullity defects it suffers from, and that said judicial resolution will be issued and notified shortly, which makes this procedure a simple tactical movement by the defense to anticipate an unfavorable judicial pronouncement, and avoid its potentially devastating effect", argues the popular accusation, which recalls that one of the reasons why this Special Plan was appealed is precisely because of the treatment it gives to Stratvs, with "determinations elaborated to force the fitting of said illegal tourist complex in the urban and environmental regulations, adjusting, like a glove to the hand, to the excessive and disproportionate construction of said winery in a protected natural space".
Among other things, it emphasizes that since the initial approval document there were "notable alterations, since from the lack of the slightest mention to the Stratvs Winery it went, without solution of continuity, to legitimize its existence", by expressly naming it and classifying it as a structuring equipment. In this way, Urban Transparency argues that it was given "a legally privileged position, such as the equalization of the illegally executed construction with the historical wineries of La Geria (which have behind them, at least, a century of history and the collective effort of several generations of farmers and peasants to access their unique position within the protected natural space)".
In addition, he states that Rosa has made "efforts" to "delay" the resolution of the dispute against the La Geria Plan, "stretching to the limit the rules of procedure of the contentious-administrative jurisdiction". In this regard, it should be recalled that the Cabildo announced a few weeks ago, when it was already known that the TSJC ruling was imminent, that it will prepare a new Special Plan for La Geria. And one of the reasons, according to the Councilor for Territorial Policy, Marcos Bergaz, is the fear that the current document will be "knocked down" by the courts.
Rosa asks the Court for speed "due to the presence of rodents" in the winery
While the popular accusation believes that the imminent decision of the TSJC on the La Geria Plan is what has caused this new request from Rosa, the businessman alleges that the closure of the winery "has caused damage to the facilities due to the existence mainly of rodents, which generates, in addition to serious health problems, significant damage to the machinery, by eating the electrical wiring". For this reason, he now asks the Court to resolve this request "as soon as possible". It should be recalled that at the beginning of this year, the property had already warned of the presence of rats in Stratvs and the investigating judge authorized them to access the complex to carry out a rat extermination treatment, under the supervision of Seprona agents.
"Juan Francisco Rosa Marrero once again shows in a stark way the conception he has of the Public Administrations and, in this particular case, of the organs of the criminal jurisdiction as an agency at the service of his occurrences and whims, and his parallel inability to understand that the precautionary measure adopted is a mere reflection of the existence of the Rule of Law and, in particular, of the principle of equality before the law", responds the popular accusation. In this regard, he emphasizes that what has happened in this case is that "Mr. Rosa Marrero committed, presumably, several crimes in the process of construction of the Stratvs winery, and his deliberate and continued departure from legality is the main cause and, in truth, the reason for the closure of the winery and the prohibition of carrying out activities".
In addition, he considers that "the new reports provided by Mr. Rosa's defense do not add anything new to those already on record in the case, nor to the arguments already rejected" up to four times, first by the investigating judge, Silvia Muñoz, and then by the Provincial Court, which dismissed the previous requests to annul the precautionary measure and allow the winery to reopen.
"Once a year he has the habit of changing lawyer" and asking for the reopening
"It is the third time in three years that the three different lawyers of Mr. Rosa and the entity BTL Lanzarote S.L. request the lifting of the precautionary measure adopted", recalls the popular accusation, emphasizing that the businessman has been changing lawyers in this case, being represented first by Felipe Fernández Camero, then by Margarita Alejo Hervás and currently by José Antonio Choclán Montalvo. "Based on the calculation of probabilities we could affirm that, at least once a year, Mr. Rosa has the habit of changing lawyer and ordering that the lifting of the precautionary measure that prevents him from opening the clandestine complex that he built in the heart of La Geria be urged", concludes Urban Transparency.
Regarding this new request to authorize the reopening, he insists that the arguments used by the defense are the same that have already been rejected on other occasions and reiterates that the only reason why it is requested again now in an "untimely and inappropriate" way is to anticipate the ruling of the TSJC in the dispute over the La Geria Plan. "This is the last opportunity to request the opening of the clandestine complex called Bodega Stratvs", insists the popular accusation, which highlights that for this the defense "reiterates" the same allegations "to satiety, even if it is necessary to handle the same arguments already rejected, manipulate the content of the expert reports that appear in the case and twist to exhaustion the interpretation of the firm judicial resolutions".
In addition to accusing Rosa of "manipulating" the intervention of the Prosecutor's Office in the adoption and maintenance of the precautionary measure of closure, the accusation also highlights that the new request of the businessman "hides data, interprets the applicable legislation in a tortuous manner, carefully extracts from the texts loose phrases that could favor the lifting of the measure and decontextualizes the content of the resolutions to, with an arbitrary and interested interpretation of said extracts, expose a fictitious and empty argumentation with which it is intended to base the lifting of the agreed measure".
In addition, contrary to what was alleged by Rosa's defense, he denies that the only reason on which the order to close Stratvs was based was the environmental risk due to spills. In this regard, he recalls different fragments of the judicial resolutions that have been adopted, both when ordering the closure and when rejecting the different appeals of the property, and also of the order that in March 2015 already ordered the opening of oral trial in this case, in which it is detailed "the scandalous accumulation of crimes that allowed the construction, commissioning and exploitation of the industrial complex called Bodega Stratvs, and that represents the most significant example of criminal urbanism practiced for years in Lanzarote, with the invaluable complicity of senior public officials and officials of the local, island and regional administration".
