Little could the investigating judge 4 of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, María de los Ángeles Lorenzo-Cáceres, imagined the vein that she was going to find as a result of the complaint presented by the then director of Sports of the Cabildo de Tenerife, Ángel Luis Pérez, for an alleged fraud on his cards worth almost 2,575 euros for purchases made at El Corte Inglés and among which there were several luxury watches. Caught by his current partner, a lawyer by profession, Pérez had no better idea than to go to a police station to report "computer fraud" and point out Marcos Navarro Tacoronte, the mediator of the corruption case that has broken out in Canary Islands and that splashes not only members of the Government of the islands but also a general of the Civil Guard division and various businessmen inside and outside the archipelago.
Tacoronte, who has a criminal record for theft, robbery with violence, fraud and falsification of public documents, had a "very bad" time the three days he was detained in jail for Pérez's false complaint and hence, pressured by what he could happen to him, he decided to collaborate with justice and hand over his two cell phones to the judge with compromising information that splashes politicians, businessmen and authorities inside and outside the Canary Islands. "I don't have a clear conscience. I regret it because I have lost the most important thing in my life, my family", says El Tacoronte now, who affirms that "he spoke because they were going to put him in jail for something he did not do", in relation to Pérez's complaint, which It was archived in the first instance and dismissed by the Provincial Court. Pérez resigned from his position in January of this year, citing personal reasons.
The analysis of the two mobile phones reveals more than 100,000 images, messages, videos, conversations and recordings that reveal a "genuine criminal organization", with a "perfectly structured and defined" hierarchy, with division of functions and a specific modus operandi supporting the commission of crimes related to corruption and with a single purpose: economic enrichment, according to a report prepared by the investigators and sent to the judge who has been handling the case since February 8. Among the 13 investigated during the last year and a half there is a general of the Civil Guard, a national deputy, a Livestock counselor and several entrepreneurs of renewable energies, drones and cheese makers, and a murky plot of friends, prostitutes, lovers and parties.
When the case came to public light, it uncovered an "illicit" network orchestrated in the Canary Islands between the then PSOE deputy in Madrid, Juan Bernardo Fuentes -a history of the party in the Canary Islands and member of the family that controls the PSOE in Fuerteventura- and his nephew, Taishet Fuentes, who took over from his uncle as Director of Livestock of the Government of the Canary Islands when he went to Madrid to take the seat in 2019. Both, with the help of the mediator, Marcos Navarro Tacoronte (the victim of the false complaint) They dedicated themselves to extorting ranchers from the islands. The cases date back to the 2020s -in the midst of the pandemic- and 2021, when the investigation began. Navarro has a family linked to the PSOE and has held public office in the archipelago, hence the friendship with Juan Bernardo Fuentes.
Navarro was in charge of intermediating between the extorted winners, some of whom entered the plot in exchange for favors, the politicians and the general. If the businessmen had sanctions imposed on their livestock farms, they were asked for a commission in exchange for reducing the penalties and they were encouraged to make fertilizers in order to benefit from subsidies, among other things. In the midst of all this, lunches, dinners and night parties are held in the Canary Islands and in Madrid attended by those investigated and in which alcohol, drugs, women and Viagra abounded. Businessmen were the ones who paid for these parties, whose cost ranged between 3,000 and 11,000 euros. All income was managed through the Vega de Tetir Sports Association (a soccer team from Fuerteventura), the Tetir Livestock and Tetir Cheeses and the Tetir Consulting and Fiscal and Accounting Consulting Juan B. Fuentes Curbelo, all owned by the deputy.
Both Juan Bernardo Fuentes and his nephew, Taishet Fuentes, are now out of politics and the party. The deputy was forced to resign from his seat on February 14 after uncovering the plot and his nephew, Taishet Fuentes, was dismissed in June 2022 after "losing confidence" in the Government of the Canary Islands. At that time, his departure from the Executive was justified by mismanagement in the livestock crisis.
The president of the Government of the Canary Islands, Ángel Víctor Torres, assures that he never knew anything about the case. The area councilor, Alicia Vanoostende, argues the same. However, the mediator has declared that what was happening in the Canary Islands was vox populi and that Torres knew perfectly well what was happening. “A dairy company is sanctioned with one million euros and this threatens the Government that it is going to pour the milk at its door. I am called urgently to intervene. The situation is appeased and it is warned that it must also be taken away from others. It is said that it is a direct order and there is only one person in the midst of a pandemic who can do that, ”says Navarro, who assures that that person is Torres.
The mediator has pointed out that he had his own office in the Government of the Canary Islands together with the director of Livestock, without being an official and that he was already leaving public offices in the midst of a pandemic, even when access controls were exhaustive due to the covid.
Also featured in the plot is the Catalan couple formed by Esteban Banús and María Inmaculada Roca, who live in the Canary Islands and have different commercial companies linked to the primary sector and who, according to the investigation reports, "wanted to obtain the license to expand the farm and obtaining subsidies, as well as obtaining new commercial contracts for their commercial brand Leche Sandra” (which they aspired to place in Canarian hospitals) and the products of their Cogrami Canarias distillery.
According to the investigation, this would be the "political branch", directed by Juan Bernardo Fuentes, known by the network as Tío Berni. This would be joined by another uncovered as the investigations progressed and described as the "business branch", at the top of which appears the already retired general of the Civil Guard Division, Francisco Espinosa Navas.
Known online as Papá Espinosa, he would have come into contact with the Fuentes through the mediator. The general, making use of the contacts he would have in the Canary Islands during his time as head of the Command (2008-2012), offered himself to peninsular businessmen to facilitate their entry into the Canary Islands Special Zone (ZEC), in exchange for commissions . In the same way, he would have participated in the extortion of the ranchers, who were threatened with being sent to Seprona to inspect their facilities if they did not pay what was requested. It seems that Espinosa's link with the Fuentes is again the mediator Navarro Tacoronte.
The plot that involves the general, the only one who is in prison without bail, reaches the Government of Spain, through different contracts awarded by different ministries to one of the companies investigated in the plot and whose owner is a personal friend. of Espinosa Navas. It is the Valencian company Asesoramiento y servicios de drones, SL, owned by José Suárez Estevez, known by the plot as José drones.
As has been discovered and is now being investigated by the judge, this company was awarded four contracts from the International Foundation for Ibero-American Administration and Public Policies, dependent on the Government of Spain, for 2.3 million euros for the Rapid Action Groups project of Surveillance and Intervention in the Sahel, in the years 2020 and 2021 when General Espinosa directed missions in the Sahel, as in charge of a gendarme training project in the area (in the Garsi-Sahel project).
Espinosa, who was arrested last week in Madrid and in whose home several shoe boxes were found with some 60,000 euros, was stationed in the Sahel between 2017 and 2021, although he continued to collaborate with rapid action groups in the aftermath. surveillance actions in the Sahel. The judge now tracks the general's accounts in different African countries, such as Mozambique, Mauritania, Niger and Mali.
An investigation has also been opened into the economic heritage of his wife and children. "Everything I do with Africa is through dad," the drone businessman comments to the mediator, Navarro Tacoronte, in one of the recorded conversations.
In addition to these contracts, the researchers are analyzing others awarded by the Ministry of Defense and the Ministry of the Interior to the drone company. There are also awards from the Government of Aragon, and the municipalities of Valdepeñas and Carmona in Seville. “Are you from the PSOE Zaragoza? If that is the case, there is nothing more to talk about”, the mediator came to point out in a conversation with Suárez Estévez, which shows how far the political threads reached.
Suárez Estévez came to be recommended by letter to work with Seprona in advising on drones by the then general of the division head of the Nature Protection Service of the Civil Guard, Antonio Tocón, who although he does not appear under investigation, is in one of the reports that are sent to the judge by the internal affairs unit of the Civil Guard.
As the researchers indicate in the report of February 8, what has been discovered so far is only "the tip of the iceberg" of a criminal network that "not only creates serious social alarm at all levels but also puts it endangers the democratic credibility of the State's administrative system and greatly damages the reputation and good work required of government agencies and public services to which the leaders of the criminal organization belong,” according to the record. In the same report it is detailed that the investigations continue, with which new pieces and derivations of this corruption case are not ruled out.
So far, the 13 investigated have been released with charges except for General Espinosa. Former deputy Juan Bernardo Fuentes testified on Wednesday and although the judge was in favor of leaving him in prison due to the risk of destroying evidence, the opinion of the special delegate prosecutor against Corruption and Organized Crime of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Jaime Serrano, prevailed. -Jover González, the only accused person, who supported his release as there was no risk of flight. Judge Lorenzo-Cáceres, upset with this decision, sent her "absolute disagreement" with the Prosecutor's Office to the media through the TSJC press room. All of them are being investigated for alleged crimes of bribery, influence peddling, document falsification, money laundering and belonging to a criminal gang.
The Mediator case has unleashed a whole political storm inside and outside the Canary Islands, with accusations against the regional government of having known about and covering up this corruption plot, as the Canary Coalition pointed out yesterday. At the national level, the PP, through the Canarian deputy Guillermo Mariscal, was in charge of sneaking this case of corruption on Tuesday in the control session with the Government.
Everything indicates that the PP will make this case its own to harm the PSOE in the face of the May elections. The popular ones requested this week an appearance in the Senate of the first vice president of the Government, Nadia Calviño, to explain the contracts of the International Foundation awarded to the investigated drone company. "The Government cannot dodge the buck in the face of such serious events," says the PP senator for Gran Canaria, Sergio Ramos.
