The judge of the Supreme Court has called for Álvaro García Ortiz, attorney general of the State, to be investigated on January 29, in the case of the alleged leak of documentation of Isabel Díaz Ayuso’s partner. A day later, the provincial prosecutor of Madrid will appear and the judge also charges Diego Villafañe, lieutenant prosecutor of the Technical Secretariat of the Prosecutor’s Office, who will testify on February 5. The magistrate affirms that there was a “coordinated operation” of the three to leak this information about Alberto González Amador, a strategy in which he accuses the Presidency of the Government of making “arrangements” so that the businessman’s confession was published by a media outlet. .
Since October, Judge Hurtado has been investigating whether the attorney general and his closest team intervened in any way in the leak of an email in which Alberto González Amador’s lawyer acknowledged his tax fraud of 350,000 euros and offered a pact to avoid jail. . After analyzing the reports from the Central Operational Unit of the Civil Guard and the testimonies it has held in recent weeks, it concludes that it is necessary to listen to the two accused: Álvaro García Ortiz, attorney general, and Pilar Rodríguez, provincial prosecutor of Madrid , in addition to extending the case to Diego Villafañe, lieutenant prosecutor of the Technical Secretariat.
Judge Ángel Hurtado understands that “there is an indicative basis to presume the relevant participation” of everyone in the leak of an email in which González Amador’s defense confessed to his two tax crimes. The instructor considers that the attorney general, the senior prosecutor of Madrid and the lieutenant prosecutor of the Technical Secretariat “could have agreed to reveal secrets or confidential information relating to another citizen”, data that “should not have been disclosed.”
The communications that the Central Operational Unit intervened in its records, says the judge, support his theory by which Álvaro García Ortiz must declare: “The sequence and haste of those steps highlight a rush on the part of the attorney general to collect a certain information,” he explains. Villafañe, he explains, is a person “trusted” by García Ortiz and could have had “a relevant role, minor if you will” but aiming for “a coordinated operation typical of a team effort.”
In his order, which for the first time in democracy calls for an attorney general to be declared under investigation in a criminal case, Judge Hurtado makes a chronology of the events: from the exchange of emails between the prosecutor Julián Salto and Alberto González’s lawyer in February 2024 until its full publication in a medium, El Plural, on the morning of March 14.
In the middle, the judge considers that the messages intercepted by the Civil Guard on Pilar Rodríguez’s phone allow the three prosecutors to be held responsible for the leak of the email on the night of March 13. When El Mundo published false information about the case, the Prosecutor’s Office compiled the information to deny it in a statement and its content was revealed by several media outlets until its full publication the following morning, in parallel to a statement from the Madrid Prosecutor’s Office regarding the case. affair.
That night of March 13, says the judge, there was a “moment of urgency and great tension” under the “leadership” of the attorney general and what the judge considers a “coordinated operation” to filter González Amador’s email from the Prosecutor’s Office. . A “team effort,” says the magistrate, endorsing the allegations of the businessman’s defense when speaking of a “Fortuny team” in his writings. The judge understands that the testimonies of journalists who revealed that they had access to the email before those key hours of March 13 do not distort the rest of the evidence.
The magistrate even considers that this email left the Prosecutor’s Office “destined” to the Presidency of the Government and from there to a media outlet, El Plural, which published the email in its entirety on the morning of March 14. “The Presidency of the Government is taking steps to publish it,” he explains, citing all the information published by Juan Lobato, then general secretary of the PSOE in Madrid: he received the email from a Moncloa advisor and showed its contents shortly after in the plenary session. the Madrid Assembly.
Charges and pending proceedings
The magistrate adds three key dates to the calendar of the case: the statement of Álvaro García Ortiz on January 29, that of Pilar Rodríguez on January 30 and that of Diego Villafañe on February 5. Also waiting to take statements, although as witnesses, from those responsible for communication from the Attorney General’s Office and the Madrid Prosecutor’s Office as well as from the prosecutor Julián Salto and his superior, Almudena Lastra.
In recent weeks, Judge Hurtado has launched proceedings and testimonies that, in the absence of the rest, provide “weighty information” to “support” the accusation of the three members of the Prosecutor’s Office leadership. Above all the records of the UCO in the offices of the attorney general and the provincial prosecutor of Madrid at the end of October, the same day that the case was placed under summary secrecy.
The agents had the mission of collecting all messages and emails related to the case and the alleged email leak. In the case of the attorney general, the Civil Guard reported that his messaging applications did not have any messages and that García Ortiz had changed his phone a week before the registration. Pilar Rodríguez’s telephone number did offer more information, with several conversations between her, Villafañe and other members of the Prosecutor’s Office following the information published by El Mundo on the night of March 13.
For the investigating judge, everything responds to a “criminal dynamic to disclose, through what is known as leaks,” the written confession of Alberto González Amador’s lawyer. The attorney general, Hurtado says, “directed the steps” and had a “relevant participation.” In recent days, eight journalists and Miguel Ángel Rodríguez, Isabel Díaz Ayuso’s chief of staff in the Community of Madrid, have also testified, although the magistrate considers that all these testimonies do not distort the evidence by which, they understand, the attorney general and his two collaborators must testify as defendants.
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