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The National Court has begun this Monday the trial against Alfredo Prada, former vice president of the Community of Madrid and Minister of Justice with Esperanza Aguirre (PP), for his alleged involvement in the irregularities detected in the contracts for the concession and construction, from 2006, of the Justice Campus, a mammoth complex that was left half-finished and never opened its doors after spending more than 100 million euros on the project. The former popular politician, who was ousted in 2008 by Aguirre after publicly supporting Mariano Rajoy in the open internal struggle for party leadership, denies any illegality and the alleged embezzlement of public coffers. And this was reiterated by his lawyer during the first session of the oral hearing, alleging that the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office has prepared the summary on “an unreal factual basis.” The Prosecutor’s Office is asking for eight years in prison for him.
The defense has insisted that the accusation is based on the thesis that part of the documentation is missing, which has been “destroyed” by the Community of Madrid itself, which is why the former leader of the PP is forced to prove his innocence. “There is no specific quantification of the damage to the Community of Madrid, which is what the accusation maintains,” added the former vice president’s lawyer.
The judicial investigation—initiated by Judge José de la Mata and completed by his successor at the head of the Central Court of Instruction 5, Santiago Pedraz—concluded that the defendants devised a “criminal plan” to “irregularly” grant contracts to several companies: “They substantially corrupted the award procedure, substantially affecting its operations and economic results,” reads one of the documents included in the summary, which focuses on several contracts: the drafting of the City of Justice project and the voluntary management of the works, the creation of the representative brand and communication strategy or the legal advice service.
In the opinion of the researchers, the investigations of the Campus of Justice case They do not reveal a diversion of funds for the personal enrichment of the accused. In this case, the summary highlights, what occurred was damage to the public coffers by, among other issues, overlooking “shortcomings and defects” in the specifications and technical valuation reports; by making “arbitrary and unjustified” proposals; and by dispensing, “on multiple occasions, with any contracting procedure.” The public ministry, which emphasizes that those involved operated knowingly of the “illegality of the action”, attributes to them crimes of prevarication, fraud against public administrations and embezzlement of public funds.
“The conduct perpetrated here affects the operating system of a public entity, which has been deteriorated, damaged and undermined, both in its impartiality, probity and prestige, as well as in its effectiveness and its patrimonial integrity (to the point of having suffered damages). the public treasury of hundreds of millions of euros),” said Judge José de la Mata when concluding this investigation.
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The fall of Prada
The story of the former counselor is a real roller coaster. After spending a decade in the Senate, he joined the regional government in 2003 under the guidance of Esperanza Aguirre, who appointed him second vice president and head of Justice and the Interior. However, everything was cut short in 2008, when the senior official aligned himself with Rajoy in the fratricidal war for control of the party after the defeat in the general elections that year. Prada then left the front line, although he returned as a deputy to Congress in 2011, where he remained until 2016. In 2018, with Pablo Casado already at the head of the PP, the party executive recovered him to head the Popular Office Office, in charge of avoiding corruption within the popular ranks. But his indictment in 2019 for the Justice Campus contracts caused his departure.
Five other defendants
In addition to Alfredo Prada, five other people sit in the dock, and the Prosecutor’s Office requests six years in prison for each of them. The name of Commissioner Andrés Gómez Gordo, former director of Security of the Madrid organization and later advisor to María Dolores de Cospedal during her time as president of Castilla-La Mancha, stands out. Gómez Gordo is also accused in the judicial investigation named caso Kitchen (the parapolice operation allegedly concocted in the Ministry of the Interior to steal sensitive documentation from Luis Bárcenas, former popular treasurer). The other four defendants who complete the hearing on the Justice Campus are: Isabelino Baños, Mariano José Sanz and Alicio de las Heras, who respectively held the positions of technical general director of the Campus, technical deputy general director and financial director; and one of the advisors, Félix José García.
During this Monday’s trial session, dedicated to the preliminary issues phase, the State Attorney’s Office has announced that it is withdrawing the accusation for technical reasons: “Not because we understand that the facts are not criminal,” he clarified. As explained by the representative of the Legal Profession, in this oral hearing Prada’s time as president of the Campus of Justice is being judged, a position from which he left in June 2008. And the transfers of state funds to the Community of Madrid for the Campus They occurred starting in November of that year, when Francisco Granados was already in charge of said organization. For this reason, the Law Office has added that, for a mere “temporary” issue, it does not make sense to continue in this part of the process focused on the Prada era, so its role as an accusation will focus and remain in that second stage. of Granados, which is still under investigation.
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