Magistrate Juan José Escalonilla, head of the Court of Instruction 42 of Madrid, has finally filed the Neuron case after more than three years of investigations. The judge has shelved the last part of the case that was still alive and for which he kept Podemos charged as a legal entity during most of his time in the Government. This piece had to do with the party's hiring of the Mexican consulting firm Neurona for advisory work for the April 2019 general elections. Escalonilla adopted this measure after receiving the final expert report that concluded that the leftist formation adjusted to the market prices when acquiring the services of the Latin American company. “The alleged commission of a crime of misappropriation of electoral funds cannot be appreciated,” states the magistrate in a resolution dated this Monday, to which EL PAÍS has had access.
With this decision, the judge raises suspicions about Podemos, which defended its innocence from the beginning and came to describe this procedure as an example of lawfare [guerra jurídica] to “persecute the political force.” Escalonilla launched the Neuron case in the summer of 2020 after receiving a complaint from a former Podemos lawyer, José Manuel Calvente, who was in conflict with the party leadership. After his statement, the magistrate opened up to 10 lines of investigation, which he has progressively filed. Among others, he ruled out paying bonuses to the manager and treasurer of Podemos; that the costs of the headquarters work were inflated; or that money was diverted from the training's solidarity fund, a fund to which officials donate part of their salary for social purposes and that the right classified as fund b. Also archived was the Nanny casea derivative that focused on the alleged use of Podemos workers to care for the daughter of the former Minister of Equality, Irene Montero, and the former vice president of the Government and former leader of the party, Pablo Iglesias.
Currently, only the piece that deals with Podemos's relationship with Neurona for the April 2019 general elections was open. The party hired the company for 363,000 euros for consulting work. At first, the judge suspected that the political force paid for services that it never provided. But, after proving the existence of these works, the magistrate turned his investigation to investigate whether the amount paid was inflated. For this reason, he commissioned an expert report from coach Aleix Sanmartín, a doctor in Political Communication from the Complutense University of Madrid (UCM), who concluded, however, that the match had adjusted to market prices. And even, as the technician emphasized in the opinion, that the cost moved in some aspects into “lower” ranges than the price expected for similar services.
“Beyond personal tastes or the opinion of each individual in relation to the works analyzed in this expert evidence, we have to conclude that the works and services analyzed comply with the canons and professional standards in the field of international political communication and the design of campaigns,” highlighted the document signed by the expert, whose referral to the court has accelerated the end of the case. As EL PAÍS advanced, after this report was notified to the parties, Juan Manuel del Olmo, head of the 2019 electoral campaign and one of the accused, already asked the magistrate to archive the investigation. A step that the magistrate finally took this Monday.
In his resolution, the magistrate assumes a large part of the conclusions of the communication expert, who valued the work sent to him and carried out by Neurona at 358,000 euros (although, according to Podemos, it is not all that the consulting firm did). Escalonilla only objects to 50,000 euros counted as a “shadow team for monitoring the electoral campaign”; but, even so, he affirms that the resulting 308,500 euros “corresponds[n] with the price set in the contract, regardless of VAT, even valued at 8,500 euros more.”
“It can be concluded, based on the above, that there is no indicative evidence that the cash of the electoral account from which the amount of said contract was paid was diverted for purposes other than those contemplated in the LOREG. [Ley Orgánica del Régimen Electoral General], which is why the alleged commission of a crime of misappropriation of electoral funds, nor of the electoral crime, cannot be appreciated,” emphasizes the magistrate, who thus archives the procedure. And he also dismisses Juan Manuel del Olmo; Daniel Martínez de Frutos, who was treasurer of Podemos; Carlos García Ramos, who served as joint administrator of the Unidas Podemos coalition; and Elías Castejón, administrator of Neurona in Spain.
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The judge had already closed the investigation period on July 27, 2022. Last September, he also dismissed Juan Carlos Monedero, founder of the party, and removed Podemos from the case as a legal entity, although he kept these investigated. former senior officials of the political force waiting to decide after receiving the expert report from Aleix Sanmartín.
After learning of the file, Juan Manuel del Olmo tweeted: “Three years of assembly and judicial persecution have ended. They tried to double us to double Pablo [Iglesias], and with it Podemos. But this time you have not succeeded either.” Pablo Fernández, current spokesman for the party, has also spoken: “After years of lawfare against Podemos, who repairs all the damage that this media-judicial collaboration has caused us?
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