The pieces that the prosecution uses to complete the puzzle of the so-called Erial case are falling into place. New statements were added yesterday to the illuminating testimony of Joaquín Barceló -Pachano- who on the second day of the trial confessed to having acted as Eduardo Zaplana's front man and having received large amounts of corrupt money in his name.
They correspond to defendants - the Cotino brothers and Juan Francisco García - whose testimonies allow us to visualize the picture that the prosecutor intends to show: the award of the Technical Vehicle Inspection (ITV) service was rigged so that Sedesa, a company owned by Juan Cotino's family, (who died in 2020 and was General Director of Police, Government Delegate, Councilor and President of Les Corts) was one of the successful bidders.
When leaving the building, Eduardo Zaplana avoided responding to the press. During the morning, he had seen and heard how one of his trusted men, Juan Francisco García, chief of staff of the Presidency during his two terms at the head of the Consell, despite not directly linking him with the money, denied the basis of his defense to the confirm the rigging in the awarding of the ITVs, confirming the thesis of an accusation to which he appeared “repentant” for having participated in the plot.
García's role is very relevant because not only was he Zaplana's right-hand man, but he also chaired the ITV contracting table, whose members were very interested in exonerating, ensuring that "they acted with absolute honesty, honesty and in accordance with the legislation". It was in the design of the public tender, as García confessed, where he acted to give Sedesa an advantage, as Juan Cotino himself requested in the presence of Zaplana.
García acknowledged that at the end of 2004, when Sedesa sold the ITV, Vicente Cotino transmitted to him, following his uncle's instructions, an amount equivalent to 30% of the capital gains obtained, which would be entered in the name of García and Joaquín Barceló in the Phoenix company.
As was predictable, the Cotino brothers offloaded the responsibility for the decisions on the former politician, who can no longer deny them. José, the least known, assured that his uncle told them in 2005 that a series of payments had to be made for the ITV awards, because that was how it had been agreed as compensation. Previously, Vicente Cotino - with experience in making agreements with the Prosecutor's Office, since in 2018 he already did so when he confessed in the Gürtel trial to having financed PP campaigns - had stated the same thing.
"He told me that Imison International - a company established in Luxembourg with 640,000 euros carried in hand by Juan Cotino when he was director general of the Police - was for the agreement that had been reached in 1997. When I asked him who it was for - that money - , told me to continue leading the company for an indefinite period of time,” he declared.
The final payment of that bribe would have been made through the transfer of the Luxembourg company in favor of two other firms -Imison and Fenix- that were placed in the name of Juan Francisco García -former chief of staff of Zaplana- and Joaquín Barceló -Pachano- .
Among the rest of yesterday's statements, the one from José Luis Olivas, former president of the Generalitat and Bancaja, stands out, who denied having influenced the award of the wind plan when he was a councilor. Olivas, who was already convicted of falsehood and a tax crime for having received half a million euros from Sedesa for the sale of shares in Proyectos Eólicos Valencianos S.A. He maintained that this payment was compensation for his intermediation in the sale.
