At least 60 people residing in an irregular situation in Spain “bought” work contracts from a consultancy in Murcia between 2019 and 2020 to apply for legal residence permits. They paid amounts ranging between 2,000 and 6,500 euros and some of them obtained their papers in this way. The Investigative Court Number 8 of Murcia has just completed the investigation phase of this case and considers that there are clear indications to continue the process against a total of 18 people: the owner of the consultancy and his son, half a dozen front men and representatives of companies without activity in the name of those that issued the false contracts, and a dozen immigrants who fell into the networks of the plot.
According to the order by which this week the court has notified the parties of its intention to move forward with the case and open an oral trial, the ringleader of this plot is the owner of the consulting firm who, together with one of his sons, “has used to everyone, immigrants, companies, front men, etc., with the sole purpose of personal enrichment.” And he has done it, points out the order to which EL PAÍS has had access, “abusing the penury and misery of weak and desperate citizens” and “even presenting himself at the judicial headquarters as a kind of redeemer or savior messiah.” Thus, the judge emphasizes that, during his statement in the investigation phase, this man acknowledged that he offered contracts to foreign people to give them “an opportunity”, and he showed himself “as a father figure”, something similar to what his son, who is a lawyer and who, according to investigations, was the person in charge of collecting, either in cash or through bank transfers, for the contracts.
The judicial investigation indicates that the procedure was similar in all cases: the owner of the consultancy offered the person in an irregular situation the possibility of paying for a contract so that they could apply for a residence permit. In some cases, the immigrants, all of them of North African origin, paid a first installment upon receiving the contract and the rest if they managed to regularize themselves. In their statements during the investigation phase, many of them indicated that the businessman himself had told them that they were not going to work for any company, that the contract for which they were paying was only for requesting the papers and that they would work once they obtained the permissions.
The contracts, according to the order, were signed with several companies in the construction and agricultural sectors, but which had little or no activity. It was precisely this that set off alarm bells in Immigration, given the high number of applications for residence permits linked to the same companies.
For the judge, who for three months has had the support of a reinforcement judge to be able to expedite the investigation of this case, there are clear indications that the defendants committed crimes against the rights of workers, belonging to a criminal organization or group. criminal, document falsification, fraud, money laundering, and usurpation of civil status.
Regarding the accusation of the immigrants who paid for the contracts, the order clarifies that the majority of them said they felt deceived by the advisor but, “nevertheless, there is evidence of falsehood in accepting, although due to their state of need, the presentation of contracts knowing that they were unreal.”
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