Case closed. The businessman who gave the Catalan hit on masks during the pandemic has admitted before the judge that he defrauded the Treasury of the VAT corresponding to the emergency operation to provide medical supplies to the Generalitat in March 2020, as elDiario.es has learned. . The man has accepted four months in prison for a crime against the Public Treasury and will not go to prison after having confessed and returned the money.
The cause dates back to the days of confinement. Basic Devices, a firm managed by businessman JMPR, was created in 2008 and in 2020 it had no workers and remained inactive. Only with the pandemic did it regain momentum: it bought medical supplies worth 28.4 million from a Chinese firm, which it then sold to two only buyers: the Institut Català de la Salut (ICS) for a total of 35 million euros and the Institut of Applied Radiopharmacy of Barcelona (IRAB) for 4.2 million.
Although when the magnitude of the payment of 35 million was revealed (paid in a single transfer on March 20, 2020, in full confinement), the Generalitat announced that it would report Basic Devices for fraud, it finally decided not to do so. The Health Department assured that, despite initial doubts, it had received the four million masks and one million protective suits that it purchased from the company.
The Anti-Fraud Office of Catalonia (OAC), the Treasury and the Prosecutor’s Office focused on the operation and its tax consequences. The agreement of conformity between the accused and the Prosecutor’s Office and the State Attorney’s Office was ratified this Wednesday before a court in Vilafranca del Penedès (Barcelona). As it is a conformity ruling, it will not be appealed by any of the parties, which will allow it to be final and the case to be closed.
The businessman has acknowledged that “he did not enter into the public treasury a part of the VAT” accrued in the two sales he made to the ICS and the IRAB. The accused has admitted a crime against the Public Treasury and has accepted the sentence of four months in prison, which he will not serve after having accepted the facts and returned the money. He will also pay a fine of 102,220 euros. Both the 255,550.3 euros defrauded and the late payment interest (13,358.55 euros) have already been returned to the Public Treasury in 2022 by Basic Devices.
Initially, the Prosecutor’s Office filed a complaint against JMPR and his son, considering that they “jointly” held the management of Basic Devices, although finally the agreement only contemplates holding the father responsible for the fraud by placing him as “the only one authorized to dispose of the company’s bank accounts.” society and co-authored on two other accounts.”
The agreement indicates that the company did not present the annual VAT summary declaration and that the quarterly declarations did not reflect the registered amounts, but rather others “by decision of the accused JMPR aimed at artificially reducing the differential” of the tax.
The operation of the masks occurred in the midst of competition and chaos between administrations to obtain medical supplies, a circumstance taken advantage of by several suppliers to obtain benefits, as reflected in the reports of the Court of Auditors on pandemic procurement.
In the case of Basic Devices, the Catalan Anti-Fraud Office ruled out that it was a case of corruption, although it did call its hiring “reckless,” made after “not very transparent” preliminary contacts with the company.
The stumbles that the Government made when purchasing material from this company also contributed to increasing suspicions. On March 19, 2020, a few days after the declaration of the state of alarm, ICS acquired medical supplies from Basic Devices for around 60 million euros, of which 35 million were finally paid. That same afternoon alarms went off in the department. of Economy and the banks warned that the company that had received the million-dollar transfer from the Generalitat had been inactive for some time and had never carried out operations of similar value.
On March 22, the administrators of Basic Devices met with those responsible for the Economy at the department’s headquarters and provided sufficient documentation to dispel suspicions and the complaint to the Mossos was withdrawn. On May 5, the Government withdrew from one of the contracts with the company and the initial agreement of 60.5 million remained at the 35 that had already been advanced in March. On December 5 of that year, the ICS certified that all the material had been received.
As this newspaper revealed, Basic Devices was a company without any type of activity, without employees and that at the time of closing the contract with the Generalitat had not properly presented its accounts in the commercial registry. It also showed how a web of false profiles about the supposed administrators of this company appeared on search engines in mid-2021, making it difficult to find who was really behind this company. The Treasury did achieve it.
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