The judge proposes to judge the former Interior dome for the "Kitchen operation", but exonerates Cospedal

Carpetazo to the "Kitchen case". The judge of the National Court Manuel García Castellón has closed almost three years later the investigation of the alleged espionage to Luis Bárcenas that would have been orchestrated in 2013 from the Ministry of the Interior with funds reserved to steal from the former treasurer documentation compromising for the PP relative to the “Gürtel case”.

In the resolution in which he agrees to transfer the proceedings to an abbreviated procedure, the magistrate proposes to judge the former Minister of the Interior Jorge Fernández Díaz, who was his "number two", Francisco Martínez, and several former police officers, but not to the one who was general secretary of the PP María Dolores de Cospedal, nor her husband, the businessman Ignacio López del Hierro.

García Castellón appreciates evidence of the commission of crimes, discovery and disclosure of secrets, prevarication, omission of the duty to prosecute crimes, bribery, influence peddling and embezzlement.

The instructor also brought the retired commissioner José Manuel Villarejo to the bench, the former operational deputy director (DAO) of the Police Eugenio Pino and the former police officers José Luis Olivera, who was head of the UDEF, Marcelino Martín Blas, José Ángel Fuentes Gago , Bonifacio Díez, Enrique García Castaño, Andrés Gómez Gordo, as well as Bárcenas' driver, Sergio Ríos.

He rules out a "political plot" outside the Interior

The magistrate points out that regardless of what the former minister's intention was, Villarejo and García Castaño intended to keep the stolen documentation to "pressure" or "extort" the leadership of the Interior and guarantee their "impunity." In addition, he sees indications that it was Francisco Martínez who would have authorized - "with the knowledge of the Minister of the Interior" - that it be paid with funds reserved for Bárcenas' driver. In fact, the instructor places Fernández Díaz at "the apex of the chain that ordered the start of the operation."

However, García Castellón - who rules out the existence of a political plot outside the Ministry of the Interior - files the case due to lack of evidence regarding Cospedal and López del Hierro, who was his chief of staff, José Luis Ortiz, as well as for Henry Olivares.

And it is that the instructor emphasizes the "weakness" of the evidence against both, so maintaining his imputation for an alleged "intellectual participation" in the operation -he argues- is only the result "of a voluntary inference without foundation in evidence any, because there is no reflection of it in the performances ”.

Feature abuse

The judge reports that those investigated in this separate piece, placed by mutual agreement and with knowledge of the illegality of the facts on a date that could not be determined between the years 2012 and 2013, launched the operation.

Thus, Fernández Díaz, Minister of the Interior and political head of this department, "with abuse of his functions and knowledge of its illegality" -assures the magistrate- urged Francisco Martínez, who was first his chief of staff and since January 2013 Secretary of State for Security, to launch "a mission aimed at obtaining information and documentation" that could be in the possession of Bárcenas.

The objective was to remove said material from the judicial authority in the investigation that was carried out within the framework of the investigation of "the Bárcenas papers", a separate piece of the "Gürtel case". With this objective, Francisco Martínez "assumed the coordination of the operation, which was entrusted, in terms of its planning and development" to the DAO Eugenio Pino.

Pino, in turn, says the magistrate, left the operation in the hands of Villarejo, who to carry it out "at first used" Commissioner Marcelino Martín Blas, who was in charge of the Internal Affairs Unit (UAI). of the Police, and later of García Castaño, head of the Central Operational Support Unit (UCAO), who "personally assumed the commitment to bring the mission to a successful conclusion", making use of the Special Follow-up Unit attached to said Unit.

Villarejo intended to "extort" Interior

It was, the judge says, to capture a collaborator close to the Bárcenas family who was capable of providing the information and access to the documentation that was being sought. The chosen one was his driver (who was referred to by the police officers as "cook", "Kitchen" or "K2"), "the most trusted person in the family environment". The reward was the delivery of 2,000 euros per month plus expenses, paid from the reserved funds, and his subsequent admission to the Police, as it happened.

García Castaño and Villarejo resorted to capturing Ríos to chief inspector Andrés Gómez Gordo, who also participated with them in the operation. The investigation, says García Castellón, has been able to prove that "without prejudice to the guidelines given by the minister and the motivations he may have", the purpose that guided both Villarejo and García Castaño was to "seize and keep said documentation in his power”, without handing it over to his superiors, “in order to obtain some kind of personal benefit, extorting or pressuring public officials or those responsible for the Ministry of the Interior with it, or simply in order to preserve their respective positions in the leadership police" and guarantee "impunity in the illicit activities that, presumably, they had been developing in parallel."

Martínez authorized the payment with reserved funds

In fact, he adds, this documentation would have finally been located in the restoration workshop of Rosalía Iglesias and seized on an unspecified date (it was in a double-bottomed cabinet) around October 2013 (and he had it in his possession at least García Castaño, from whom Villarejo insistently demanded a copy, with the knowledge of his superior Eugenio Pino.

The irregularities in the management and control of the reserved funds - the magistrate maintains - would have allowed both their illegal use to finance "an intrinsically illegal police operation" and the "personal enrichment" of high-ranking police officers. And it is that the judge sees indications that it was Francisco Martínez who allegedly authorized that it be paid with funds reserved for Sergio Ríos.

This "irregular" delivery of reserved funds - the judge of the National High Court maintains - was "verbally authorized" by the DAO Eugenio Pino "and was ultimately allowed" by the Secretary of State for Security "with the knowledge of the minister inland".

Once the operation was concluded, "and in order to ensure his silence", the Secretary of State "maneuvered" so that Ríos entered the National Police Corps.

The judge rejects, as Anticorruption and some defenses had requested, to prolong the investigation further, considering "useless" and even "impertinent" some measures proposed to lengthen the investigation. And he reminds us that our procedural legislation does not admit prospective investigations: "The investigative activity cannot be conceived as a kind of releasing the anchoring net in case the crime is found, quite the opposite."