The National Court had opened a case against the energy company’s subsidiary for alleged payments to the former commissioner to spy on other companies
National Court judge Manuel García Castellón has agreed to dismiss the case against Iberdrola Renovables Energía (a subsidiary of the energy group) in the Tándem case, as the crimes stem from the commission the company has sent to Commissioner José Manuel Villarejo have been prescribed to investigate a Swiss company with which it had several business conflicts for the implementation of a series of projects in Romania.
In an injunction, the head of the Sixth Central Investigative Court analyzes the statute of limitations of criminal liability of legal entities related to the bribery offense under investigation and concludes that the maximum sentence that could correspond to Iberdrola Renovables Energía would be two years, for which the statute of limitations would be five years .
For the instructor, the unambiguous data that can help specify the day on which the prescription is to be calculated is the date Villarejo consented to voluntary retirement, i.e. June 22, 2016, the time that determines “the day on which the offense of active bribery could no longer be charged, as the person under investigation would no longer be considered an authority or official defined in the Criminal Code, which would not prosecute the offense of bribery.
So, the magistrate adds, the deadline to start counting the term would be June 22, 2016 and the end would be July 9, 2021, the date when the imputation order of the legal entity of Iberdrola Renovables Energía is issued . “That is, the facts on the date of imputation, carried out in accordance with the provisions of Articles 131.1 and 66.2bis of the Criminal Code, were prescribed, since the 5-year period to which we have referred has expired,” it states. command.
“According to the transcribed arguments, it can be concluded that the crimes charged against Iberdrola Renovables Energía, SA would have been prescribed when the order of 07/9/2021 was issued, so there would be no option but the presence of these extinction of responsibility, and with it the free dismissal under art. 637.3 of the Criminal Procedure Law”, the judge concludes.
Iberdrola Renovables Energía had assured that the services offered by the retired commissioner were a “scam” and a “pure trick”. For example, the subsidiary of the energy group chaired by Ignacio Sánchez Galán – recently acquitted of the so-called ‘Villarejo case’ – defends that the accusation against it is unfounded because it had no part in hiring the undercover agent and did not do everything commissioned to spy on the Swiss company Eólica Dobrogea, as well as its representative Corneliu Dica, with whom the electricity company is said to have formed an alliance to carry out a project in Romania.
Iberdrola Renovables was sued as a legal entity in item 17 of the macro case ‘Tándem’ – which related to the work performed by the former police officer for Iberdrola – for the payment of an invoice of 29,500 euros, in February 2012, to the Cenyt Group, the business network headed by the retired commissioner, in connection with the investigation of the Swiss company and its managers, after several conflicts arose. Villarejo called this work the ‘Wind Project’. In his statement to the judge, on January 20, the subsidiary’s representative indicated that this payment did not correspond to a specific service, but to the costs generated by an offer of something that was never entered into.
Source: La Verdad
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