Judge Peinado opens new investigation against Sánchez's wife over irregularities in European contracts
A Red.es tendering process worth more than four million euros, funded with EU money, allegedly disregarded tender requirements to favour a firm linked to businessman Barrabés, according to alerts from the European Public Prosecutor's Office and the Guardia Civil.
Judge Peinado opens new investigation against Sánchez's wife over irregularities in European contracts
The Madrid court presided over by Juan Carlos Peinado has decided to separate out a portion of the case against Begoña Gómez to examine possible illegalities in a public contract managed by Red.es. The ruling, adopted after receiving communications from both the European Public Prosecutor's Office and the Guardia Civil's specialist economic crime unit, points to breaches against the administration and damage to EU coffers.
The contract under scrutiny corresponded to the business assistance programme "Acelera Pyme", funded with just over four million euros from the European Regional Development Fund. The company that secured the service was part of a joint venture that included Innova Next SL, a company previously linked to businessman Juan Carlos Barrabés, alongside consultancy KPMG and a third partner.
The alert from the EPPO, dated 8 June, drew the investigating judge's attention to indications that the contracting board had breached the tender terms by awarding the maximum score in one of the decisive criteria without the winning bid providing a mandatory document: the so-called "white paper". This document was a sine qua non condition for assessing the technical suitability of the bids.
The UCO analysts, after examining the electronic correspondence linked to the procedure, allegedly found that the evaluators were aware of the absence of that document in the proposal from the joint venture that ultimately won the tender. The recovered messages contained internal observations that explicitly referred to that lack, although the official reports omitted any mention of it, which would have prevented the other participants from being able to lodge a complaint.
One and the same official—identified as Luis Prieto—signed off the evaluation reports for the three case files analysed, according to the documentation sent to the court. The judge has asked the Public Prosecutor to rule on the criminal nature of these acts before advancing in the investigations.
This branch of the case adds to other lines already opened regarding the management of the Entrepreneurship Institute of the Complutense University during the period when Gómez was at the head of that entity.
Source: ABC