The former president of the Generalitat Valenciana and former minister of the PP, Eduardo Zaplana, assured this Thursday that he has no intention of escapingand his lawyer alluded to his chronic leukemia as a “rooting element”.
Zaplana appeared this Thursday in the Fourth Section of Valencia at the request of the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office to enter preventive detention after being sentenced, on October 15, to ten years and five months in prison by political corruption crimes. In addition, the court imposed fines of more than 25 million euros.
The anti-corruption prosecutor, Pablo Ponce, estimated that Zaplana continues to have access to economic resources abroad and recalled the case of the former director of the Valencian Export Institute (IVEX). José María Tabares, who fled to Japan after being sentenced in 2012 to five years in prison for embezzlement committed during the payment of six million euros to singer Julio Iglesias.
On this subject, Zaplana took the floor in turn and insisted that the conviction of Tabares was possible because the Generalitat, under his presidency, filed a complaint against him.
The prosecutor began his intervention by recalling that the situation of Zaplana has changed “considerably” after knowing the sentence handed down in the Erial case for “serious crimes associated with political corruption”.
“The sentence imposed is a motivation to escape the action of justice. Has access to economic means and to people who manage assets abroad,” the prosecutor said.
Concerning his health problems, he estimated that the former minister could be processed in first world countries who do not have extradition treaties with Spain.
“There is no risk to your healthwas present at all the hearings of the trial and led a normal life, which we are happy about,” concluded the representative of the Public Prosecutor’s Office.
Zaplana’s defense, led by former prosecutor Daniel Campos, contributed to the trial the latest forensic report on Zaplana carried out by doctors from the Institute of Legal Medicine of Valencia, carried out in 2019.
Pre-trial detention is, according to him, a “useless measure” because there is no risk of hiding evidence nor to escape the action of Justice.
The Constitutional Court “has already declared that This is not a legitimate objective to avoid the social alarm that this type of conviction produces. Let’s forget the seriousness of the crime as a social alarm,” Campos reiterated, who insisted that Zaplana “continues to be protected by the presumption of innocence” until the sentence is final.
“Zaplana has always obeyed. He did not flee, he is there, at the disposal of the court, He lives in Benidorm, where he has his daughters, grandchildren and sisters.…and he has his pension in Spain, which is his only means of subsistence,” he added.
Regarding the oncological disease from which the former president suffers, he assured that it is chronic and added: “Another thing is that he controls it thanks to the rigorous treatment that he follows, but he must be constantly monitored by analyses, vaccines and other tests“.
“Confinement in a penitentiary center leads to a serious risk to your health. This is not what this defense says, but rather the forensic doctors,” recalled Daniel Campos, who also stated that Spanish law allows the suspension of prison sentences in cases of incurable illnesses.
Finally, he also mentioned Tabares’ escape, because “it is anecdotal and absurd”, according to him, to mention this affair. “If an erroneous diagnosis of the risk of flight had been made then, now there is no need to repeat it“, he remarked.
After leaving the courthouse, Zaplana admitted to reporters that the sentence was “a hard and unexpected blow”but he rejoiced at the acquittal of several colleagues on the bench.
“The court excluded any responsibility in the Valencian Community wind project, it was clear that I had nothing to do with it, but my action was the same as in the ITV, that is- say none. The differential fact is some opaque or agreement of certain people with the prosecution. I will resort to all authorities“logically,” he concluded.
