Josep Maria Bartomeu feels he is the victim of malpractice on the part of the Mossos d'Esquadra, since he considers that the Catalan police are going overboard in their investigation. “The Mossos make statements that have nothing to do with the investigation ordered by the judge, that is, the hiring of the Nicestream company, the origin of Barçagate, uncovered by the SER chain in February 2020.
The former president of FC Barcelona accuses the investigators of "meddling" in his personal and professional life "not respecting the object of the procedure" instead of prosecuting the alleged crimes ordered by the court. According to Bartomeu, this practice, known as prospective investigation or fishing expedition, is openly prohibited by law.
In addition, the former president recalls in his letter that Judge Alejandra Gil, of the Investigating Court number 13, already withdrew a controversial Mossos report from the case in March in which investigators suspected that the former head of Barça's legal services, Roman Gómez Ponti, and the former general director of the club, Òscar Grau, would be behind the leak of Leo Messi's contract to the newspaper El Mundo.
In his allegations, Bartomeu, who was arrested in March 2021 for the case and spent a night in jail, again asks the magistrate to "expel this new report on the procedure." In these conclusions, the Mossos pointed out that the president of Barça between 2014 and 2020 diverted money from the club for personal purposes. According to the former president, it is "a story riddled with falsehoods."
Lastly, Bartomeu denies that the company Amalgama Marketing SL was hired on time "to pay journalists or businessmen." "It's false," he says. And he also wants to clarify that Amalgama was "one of the different communication agencies that he had hired" the Blaugrana club during his tenure.
