The Supreme Court has confirmed the sentence of one of the main pieces of the Unión case, in which the historical leader of the PIL, Dimas Martín, and nine other people were convicted for crimes of illicit association, bribery, embezzlement, prevarication and fraud. The ruling rejects the appeals filed by Martín and by two other defendants - former PIL councilor Antonio Machín and businessman Manuel Gregorio Reina Fabre - making the convictions final.
The sentence that has now been ratified, and which was issued three years ago, pointed to Dimas Martín as "the true "doctor" of the corrupt plot, centered on the City Council of Arrecife, where his party governed at that time. In his case, he must serve a sentence of seven years and five months in prison and 22 years of disqualification, and pay a fine of 4,200 euros and another of 219,000 euros, corresponding to the money he received in bribes from different businessmen. other accused, will have to return to the City Council 129,985 euros, which were embezzled with the payment of false invoices.
The penalty is even greater for the former Councilor for Parks and Gardens, Antonio Machín, sentenced to 8 years and one day in jail, 18 years of disqualification and a fine of 95,000 euros , together with the obligation to return 79,406 euros to the Arrecife City Council in solidarity.
The other former PIL councilor who returned to sit on the bench in this piece, Ubaldo Becerra, must serve 4 years and two months in prison and pay a total fine of 70,900 euros, along with the return of the embezzled money. In his case, he lowered the sentence by applying his confession and "collaboration with Justice" as mitigating factors.
Along with Becerra, in this trial also confessed the former inspector of Arrecife, Carlos Sáenz, the head of the Technical Office, Rafael Arrocha, the engineer Antonio Cárdenas and some of the businessmen accused of receiving fraudulent awards or collecting false invoices from bribe exchange.
"The corrupt black history that devastated Arrecife"
"This goes beyond the very concept of corruption. Everything had to go through the Tahíche filter, through the prison gaze of an inmate. There is no article in the Penal Code that includes this level of crime, that submission," prosecutor Javier Ródenas told the present their conclusions during the trial, describing the "corrupt black history that devastated the City Council of Arrecife between 2007 and 2009".
For Carlos Sáenz, who has already accumulated several convictions behind him, the penalty is three and a half years in prison and absolute disqualification for five years, in addition to the obligation to return 129,985 euros to the City Council in solidarity.
As for Rafael Arrocha, who has also been in prison for another previous conviction, in this case he is only fined 2,160 euros , for the crime he recognized of disclosing confidential information. Antonio Cárdenes also accepted a sentence of only a fine, in his case of 4,225 euros , for a crime of taking advantage of reserved information.
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