The judge rejects the PSOE’s complaint to implicate the leadership of the Andalusian Government in the SAS contracts by not providing any evidence

In an order issued on January 7, to which ABC has accessed, the Investigative Judge number 13 of Seville, Javier Santamaría Leo, has refused to expand the investigation initially opened against three SAS managersas requested by the 30 regional deputies of the PSOE, who were betting on carrying out a “general review” of the contracts of the public health agency and involving the leadership of Juanma Moreno’s Government in the alleged fraud.

It is the response that the investigating magistrate of these preliminary proceedings gives to the request of the PSOE to charge seven health service purchasing delegates for alleged crimes of embezzlement of public funds, document falsification and criminal organization under the argument that the leadership of the Andalusian Executive knew at least four emergency health contracts signed between 2021 and 2022when the legal coverage for health restrictions had expired, the amount of which amounted to 31 million euros.

Lack of evidence to implicate the Andalusian Government

The magistrate dismantles the PSOE’s attempt to raise the charge to “the highest levels of the Junta de Andalucía”, as the main opposition group had requested, and warns that it does not provide any evidence to support said accusation. “Although it is alleged that there must be guidelines, instructions,” the judge reproaches him that “no document is provided that would even indirectly determine that they exist and that they correspond to the central services [del SAS]who are the subject of investigation in these preliminary proceedings.

For this reason, the investigator of the case agrees to reject the extension of the complaint presented on December 5 by the socialist parliamentarians and assures that “he is not competent to hear about possible provincial irregularities that have no relation to the central services.” He adds that «There is no justification for this Court to assume the extension of the complaint of all non-complianceit cannot be extended to the entire contracting or a general review that does not correspond to this Court, the instruction being limited to file 110/21 (service contracts) and file number 2/21 (works contracts, execution of the second phase of works at the Vigil de Quiñones Military Hospital in Seville).

In his car, the judge It only considers “relevant” for the investigation three documents referring to reports from the SAS Central Intervention of the years 2020-2023 since they refer to “emergency contracts signed by the central services for complementary healthcare services to users of the Andalusian Health Service for medical stays” due to the overload of hospital resources that occurred during the pandemic of covid.

In their expanded complaint, the socialists pointed to an alleged criminal liability of the Minister of Health or members of the Government Councilthat is, above the three positions currently investigated, which are the managing director of the Andalusian Health Service, Valle García, and her two predecessors in the position. The current head of the SAS was previously in charge of purchasing at the Reina Sofía University Hospital in Córdoba.

«The highest levels of the Andalusian Government would necessarily have had complete knowledge and they would have consented to the described corrupt hiring in the emergency area of ​​the SAS […] The Government Council itself necessarily had to warn that a clamorous chain of illegal hiring was taking place within the SAS. […] knowing the irregularities and serious crimes occurred in the hiring of the SAS“, did not act, but rather consented or tolerated, and did not stop the practice that today is revealed as a patent violation of the criminal order,” the socialists argued in the extension of the complaint filed.

Lack of connection of the new reported events

Judge Santamaría affirms that “none of the connection assumptions” included in article 17 of the Criminal Procedure Law exist for him to assume the investigation of these new facts, “since there is no coincidence regarding their object or in “As for the subject, beyond the possible typology of emergency contracting.” Regarding the mention that the PSOE makes to an emergency award of the information and access control service to the Reina Sofía Hospital in Córdoba that Valle García Sánchez processed as managing director of said center, indicates that “the jurisdiction, in its case, would correspond to the Córdoba Instruction Plays.”

In his resolution rejecting the complaint, the magistrate specifies that “the non-compliance” mentioned by the 30 socialist deputies refer “to various contracts signed by the different health logistics contracting platforms or provincial purchasing centers who have management in the contracting of the health centers of the respective province, by the provincial directors who dictate and subscribe. Therefore, it considers that “the jurisdiction to hear each one corresponds to the Investigating Court of the province” in question.

In their extension of the complaint of December 5, 2024, the socialists contributed to the Court reports prepared by provincial interventions referring to emergency hiring in the eight provinces Andalusian: Huelva (above the Juan Ramón Jiménez Hospital in the capital of Huelva), Jaén, Seville (Virgen del Rocío Hospital), Cádiz (Puerta del Mar Hospital), Córdoba (Reina Sofía Hospital), Almería (Torrecárdenas and Poniente University Hospitals), Malaga and Granada (Virgen de las Nieves Hospital).

In addition, the Socialist Parliamentary Group handed over to the judge an audit of the Public Health Emergencies Company in Andalusiaa document on the Public Health Business Agency Hospital Alto Guadalquivir, which manages centers in the provinces of Jaén and Córdoba, and other reports of provincial SAS interventions related to a “plurality of services” awarded in 2021.

The Prosecutor’s Office rejected the general review of the orders

The Prosecutor’s Office also previously limited the investigation to certain emergency contracts and in a letter submitted to the court assured that said case does not involve opening a “general review of the contracting carried out by the Junta de Andalucía», as the PSOE claims.

In its complaint, which gave rise to this criminal procedure, the Socialist Group in the Andalusian Parliament pointed out the theory that “the emergency contracts were nothing more than a colossal fraud that hid a stubborn will to hire companies by hand that were chosen based on unknown and opaque criteria».

Both the Court and the Prosecutor’s Office have deflated the expectations of the PSOE to open a general case against the Government of Juanma Moreno, coinciding with the imminent departure of Juan Espadas from the General Secretariat of the PSOE Andalusian, who had built his opposition strategy around this judicial case that the socialists came to compare with the ERE case despite describing it as an “invention” of the political and media right with the complicity of the judges.