Granados sentenced to two and a half years in prison for corruption in Púnica case
The Audiencia Nacional finds the former general secretary of the Madrid People's Party guilty of fraud and abuse of power for rigging contracts. It also convicts four former mayors and one former senator from the People's Party.
Granados sentenced to two and a half years in the first major Púnica trial over contracts
The Audiencia Nacional has sentenced Francisco Granados, former general secretary of the People's Party in Madrid and former regional councillor during the governments of Esperanza Aguirre, to two and a half years in prison for fraud and abuse of power, according to El País. The court also imposes on him eight and a half years of special disqualification from employment or public office for his participation in the rigging of contracts between 2004 and 2013 in favour of the company Waiter Music, which organises celebrations in municipalities governed by the People's Party in Madrid.
The ruling, which runs to more than 200 pages and is dated this Wednesday, is the second conviction that the Penal Chamber of the Audiencia has handed down against the former conservative leader. In 2017, Granados was already sentenced to two years in prison—later confirmed by the Supreme Court—for having received a warning from a Civil Guard officer about investigations that were underway. That sentence is now added to by the two and a half years from the new ruling.
A system of influence without formal authority
The court concludes that Granados managed to accumulate an "enormous capacity for influence" over the bodies that decided on public contracts, despite not formally holding any "direct administrative authority". From his "position of political power", he acted as the "driving force and facilitator of the system" of corruption devised to benefit businessman José Luis Huerta, owner of Waiter Music, who died before the trial began.
In exchange for favours in the awarding of contracts, Huerta funded private events for Granados and gave him gifts. The Civil Guard emphasised during the trial the close "friendship" that the People's Party leader had forged with the businessman and highlighted that "Granados had the power to remove and appoint mayors. Many owed him for putting them on the lists".
Four former mayors and one former senator also convicted
In addition to Granados, the Audiencia Nacional sentences five other People's Party officials to prison. José Carlos Boza, former mayor of Valdemoro, receives the highest sentence among the municipal leaders: four years in prison. With two years in prison are sentenced José Miguel Moreno, also former mayor of Valdemoro; María Ángeles Herrera, former mayor of Ciempozuelos; Carlos Alberto Estrada, former mayor of Moraleja de Enmedio; and David Erguido, former senator and former regional deputy. The court acquits Esteban Parro and Daniel Ortiz, former mayors of Móstoles.
The Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office had initially requested six years in prison for Granados, a figure it reduced to three during the trial itself. The judges have noted the mitigating factor of undue delay due to the time elapsed until the oral hearing took place.
Predetermined contracts and unbilled services
The ruling describes in detail the mechanics of the scheme: those convicted manoeuvred to "predetermine" that Waiter Music or companies "controlled" by Huerta would obtain the contracts. Through this arrangement, the People's Party officials not only ensured themselves a company organising celebrations, but this company "provided them with extra services on request" from the politicians themselves—including the provision of "private services for People's Party events" or for "its members", which "were never invoiced"—.
The businessman's profits were substantial. Valdemoro Town Council alone, the municipality where Granados served as mayor between 1999 and 2003 and the epicentre of the scheme, paid him almost nine million euros between 2004 and 2013. Ciempozuelos invoiced him over 1.2 million between 2007 and 2012; Moraleja de Enmedio, another half a million in the same period; and Algete, where Erguido was a councillor, nearly 1.9 million.
The ruling lists dozens of manipulated contracts, ranging from patron saint festivities to parades and carnivals. The sentence also states that Granados used his position within the Aguirre Government to direct awards dependent on the Madrid Community towards Huerta, such as the Night of the Proms concert held on 31 March 2007 at the Palacio de los Deportes. According to the judges, "the first avenue of direct aid to Huerta for the event to take place came from the Ministry of Culture and Sports", taking advantage of the post of councillor that Granados then held.
"Guarantor of the illicit system"
The three judges who tried this part of the Púnica case—Félix Alfonso Guevara, Ana Mercedes del Molino and María Fernanda García—conclude that Granados's participation "is not structured as a mere occasional instigator, but as guarantor of the illicit system, whose stability depended on his position of power and capacity for control". The sentence concludes: "Granados's position was decisive in establishing the informal operating rules" of the scheme.
The Púnica case is a large-scale investigation opened in 2014 that has been divided into more than a dozen lines of inquiry. Since then, five trials on the scheme have been held, and Granados has been named as a defendant in only two of them: the one concerning the Civil Guard officer's warning and the present one, focused on Waiter Music contracts.
Source: El País