The European Public Prosecutor’s Office has come to the conclusion that it is its responsibility to investigate all Koldo case, both the parts that concern the ramifications in the Balearic Islands and the Canary Islands and those that affect the central Government, which are investigated in the National Court. For this reason, this Thursday he sent a letter to Court Number 2 of this court, headed by Ismael Moreno, demanding the files in the summary, according to what judicial sources inform EL PAÍS.
The prosecutors dependent on the community institution had long requested a report from the Central Operational Unit (UCO) of the Civil Guard to find out if there was sufficient basis to take this step. That document has already arrived at the community institution and, with it on the table, they have decided to ask the judge in the case at the Court to recuse himself in their favor. The European Public Prosecutor’s Office confirms that, in reality, it is a single plot that operated in different parts and that, therefore, it is logical that it be in charge of the entire investigation, since in some files it affects money from the budget of the EU.
Since the European Public Prosecutor’s Office was launched three years ago, whenever a case of corruption arises in which funds from the Union budget are affected, it is that body that is competent to carry out the investigation. In it Koldo case, at least in the awarding of contracts in the Balearic Islands and the Canary Islands, there are EU resources and, therefore, it has been in charge of those parts of the investigation for months. He now asks for the rest after studying the information sent to him by the Civil Guard because he understands that it is a single plot and that the case must be unified for the benefit of the investigation.
Almost from the beginning, the European Public Prosecutor’s Office has been very close to the Koldo case. It received a first complaint on June 30, 2022, at which time it began to collect information to find out if community funds were affected. The complainant was the spokesperson of the PP in the Madrid Assembly, Alfonso Serrano, the same one who presented the complaint to the Spanish public ministry. Almost a year later, in April 2023, they asked Anti-Corruption for data on the reported contracts. The answer came two months later, in June, with information about the Balearic Islands and the Canary Islands.
There have been more requests for information, specifically in October 2023, but at this time the investigation was already judicialized and the secrecy of the summary decreed, so Judge Ismael Moreno did not send more data. It was not until the case exploded and became the subject of media attention, already in January and February of this year, that the European Public Prosecutor’s Office had access to more documentation. Subsequently, the request for the report came to the Civil Guard, which gave rise to this Thursday’s claim.
This public ministry, based in Luxembourg, has already investigated cases of alleged fraud related to public contracts signed during the pandemic on occasion. The most striking of them was the one that affected the brother of the president of the Community of Madrid, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, which finally ended up archived. That case caused a loud clash between European prosecutors and Anti-Corruption. The two bodies wanted to take charge of the case and finally the decision that was made was Solomonic. In both cases the investigations ended up being archived.
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Now, if the judge of the National Court does not recuse himself and agrees to the claim of the European Prosecutor’s Office, the decision will not be in the hands of the State Attorney General’s Office. As the case is judicialized, it will be a court that will have to decide which body is competent to continue the investigation. This will avoid, in principle, one of the problems that Luxembourg usually denounces about its work in Spain: in the event of a conflict of powers, the State Attorney General’s Office decides, which is judge and party, since it is hierarchically in charge of Anti-Corruption, with whom European prosecutors often have these conflicts.
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