The trial of piece number 13 of the Unión case, for the payment of 250,000 euros to the company Proselan for allegedly unperformed work, has been adjourned for sentencing this Friday. During the last day of the trial, which was held by videoconference, the Prosecutor's Office maintained the accusation and the request for penalties for three of the accused (the auditor of Arrecife, Carlos Sáenz, the former head of the Technical Office, Rafael Arrocha, and the businessman José Daniel Hernández Arráez) and has reduced the request for the fourth, the former Finance Councilor José Miguel Rodríguez.
Initially, the Prosecutor's Office was asking for 6 years in prison for him, but this Friday it has modified its request, leaving it at 1 year and 4 months in prison and three years of absolute disqualification, applying the mitigating factors of reparation of damage and collaboration with justice, for having returned part of the embezzled money and for having confessed the facts.
The prosecutor Ignacio Stampa recalled that before the trial began, José Miguel Rodríguez acknowledged having contributed to embezzling that money and already returned 2,400 euros, as a first payment. "The amount can be considered derisory, but it is justified", the Public Prosecutor's Office stressed, recalling the economic circumstances of the accused, which he himself explained during the first day of the trial. "Paying 2,400 euros for José Miguel Rodríguez may be much more than 600,000 euros for Carlos Sáenz", Stampa stressed, referring to another of the accused sitting in the dock.
In addition, the Prosecutor's Office maintains that Rodríguez was "the fundamental person" in the alleged plot to embezzle that public money, since he was the only public official who intervened, so it considers that his confession is even more important. Regarding the reduction of the sentence, the prosecutor explained that it is "what the law contemplates" when these circumstances occur and contrasted the attitude of the former councilor with the "absence of remorse from the rest of the accused", despite the "grotesque" nature of their attitude and the evidence provided during the trial.
"Everyone has the right to repent"
The lawyer of José Miguel Rodríguez, who had already adhered on the first day to the account of the facts presented by the Prosecutor's Office, has also shown this Friday his agreement with the penalties requested now by the prosecutor. "Everyone has the right to repent", the lawyer stressed.
For their part, the defenses of the other three defendants, who have requested acquittal, have focused part of their final conclusions on trying to discredit the confession of the former councilor. The lawyer of Rafael Arrocha recalled that an accused has "the right to lie" and has suggested that "maybe" José Miguel Rodríguez "lied when recognizing a fact that never existed;". That is, he argues that the former councilor could admit to having incurred in crimes of malfeasance and embezzlement of public funds without having committed them. The three defenses have agreed on this same argument, suggesting that Rodríguez could have acknowledged something he did not do in order to get a reduction in the penalty.
For her part, Carlos Sáenz's lawyer has even accused Rodríguez of using the "fan theory". The lawyer was responding to the statement of the former councilor during the first day of the trial, when he spoke of a habitual "modus operandi" in the City Council to pay fraudulent invoices, in which "the one who had to be there was always Carlos Sáenz". Even, Rodríguez went so far as to say that as a councilor he authorized the payment of those invoices because the auditor had previously "consented" to the payment of others "in the same way", so that he or his party, the PIL, "would profit".
"He is convicted and my client is not", Carlos Sáenz's lawyer pointed out this Friday, responding to José Miguel Rodríguez. "The statements he made against my client are slanderous", the lawyer defended, while Arrocha's defense has even asked that the testimony of José Miguel Rodríguez, who incriminated himself and also testified against the rest of the accused, not be taken into account as evidence by the court when issuing a sentence.
"Fraudulent", "gross" and "shoddy"
For its part, the Prosecutor's Office has maintained in its conclusions that the defendants have not provided during the trial "a single piece of evidence" that the work for which the City Council paid 250,000 euros to the businessman José Daniel Hernández, for alleged electricity work at various festivals in the capital, was actually carried out. In addition, it has described as "fraudulent", "gross" and even "shoddy" the way in which these invoices were paid, which were not even presented in the General Registry of the City Council, but went directly to the Intervention Department.
For both the auditor and Rafael Arrocha, the Prosecutor's Office is asking for 6 years in prison and 9 years of disqualification, while for the businessman it is demanding 5 and a half years in prison for a continued crime of falsification of a commercial document, another of malfeasance (as an instigator) and two more of embezzlement of public funds and fraud (as a necessary cooperator). The prosecutor also asks that the four defendants, including José Miguel Rodríguez, and also the company Proselan as jointly and severally liable, be sentenced to return "jointly and severally" the allegedly embezzled amount, which amounts to a total of 251,293 euros.
ADVANCE PENDING EXTENSION
