MADRID, Spain – The investigation into the alleged PSOE dirty operations network will proceed as normal at the National High Court despite the snap general election, though Judge Santiago Pedraz does not plan to carry out politically explosive measures in the weeks before the vote. Anti-Corruption prosecutors and the magistrate himself see it as feasible to indict the PSOE for bribery and influence peddling, according to legal sources, but no decision will be taken before 29 November, when Spaniards head to the polls.
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“We will keep moving forward, except for measures with a very direct impact on the elections,” sources in the Prosecutor’s Office said. Other legal sources rule out that the summons of PSOE legal services director Alberto Cachinero or of Leire Díez and Santos Cerdán, the main defendants in the case, will be agreed before 29 November, partly because the Civil Guard’s Central Operational Unit is still analysing key files and documents needed for the interrogations.
There is nonetheless one important piece of business on the calendar that will go ahead regardless of the election call: the testimony of Beatriz Biedma, the investigating magistrate who led the probe against the prime minister’s brother. Pedraz has admitted her as an injured party, at least for the crime of slander, though she denounces more serious matters. Specifically, the judge maintains that Leire Díez’s network contacted a drug-trafficking clan in Badajoz to whom they provided information about the magistrate in order to intimidate her.
The UCO has travelled to Badajoz to question one member of the clan, and Biedma could provide new information at her statement on Thursday. Beyond that, no politically significant developments are expected until after the election. The same case also examines alleged corruption within the State Industrial Participation Company, the state’s investment arm, in events predating the political plumbing operations and involving the former partner of Santos Cerdán, Joseba Antxon Alonso, and former SEPI president Vicente Fernández. According to the judicial sources consulted, this second part of the case is advancing much more slowly given the complexity of the financial measures required.
The sources stress that several Civil Guard reports are still pending before Judge Pedraz. On 26 May, the magistrate sent the UCO to the PSOE headquarters to gather a considerable amount of information, and the force has yet to deliver a report on the emails of Cerdán, the PSOE manager, former communications director Ion Antolín and two party workers. Also pending is analysis of the log of physical entries to PSOE headquarters, with which the magistrate aims to corroborate whether Leire Díez, Vicente Fernández, Antxon Alonso and others such as businesswoman Carmen Pano entered the building, with Pano claiming to have handed over 90,000 euros in cash inside. That day in May, the judge also requested the PSOE’s accounting books for 2024 and 2025 for subsequent study by the acting police force.
These and other inquiries could lead the Civil Guard to find new evidence against the network or corroborate what already forms part of the investigating thesis, which the judge summarised in his late-May order listing alleged crimes including criminal organisation, bribery, disclosure of secrets, inducing false testimony, false accusation, falsification of commercial documents, prevarication, influence peddling and crimes against the institutions of the state. Among them, the bribery and influence peddling allegedly committed by Santos Cerdán could be extended to the PSOE itself as a legal person.
Sources close to the investigation point to Article 31 bis of the Criminal Code as the tool that could lead to the party’s indictment, with its first section setting out when criminal liability can be attributed to a legal person. The possibility of this happening to political parties came to Spain through a 2012 legal reform, as until then both political formations and unions were exempt from criminal conviction. Under that article, a legal person can be investigated or convicted of an offence when it is committed by a member authorised to take decisions on its behalf and seeking direct or indirect benefit for the organisation, meaning the PSOE could face indictment if any of its charged members, former organisation secretary Santos Cerdán or Ana María Fuentes, committed a crime in the party’s name and for its benefit.
The dirty operations case is far from the only one worrying Pedro Sánchez on the road to an election, with the PSOE’s judicial concerns focused on several National High Court courts. Central Investigating Court number 2, led by Ismael Moreno, is handling several strands of the Koldo case: the masks affair that led to the historic Supreme Court conviction of José Luis Ábalos, one of the government’s biggest blows this legislature, with the court still to complete the investigation affecting former Adif president Isabel Pardo de Vera among others; the strand on public works rigging that benefited Acciona and ended Santos Cerdán’s political career; and the third strand, likely the one worrying Ferraz most, being conducted under seal with the collaboration of Víctor de Aldama and probing possible irregularities in PSOE financing.
At Central Investigating Court number 3, Judge María Tardón is investigating the mass entry of migrants into Ceuta in late July, which the magistrate describes as a grave attack on Spain’s territorial integrity, with the case advancing on two fronts: determining who was behind the attack and examining possible criminal responsibility in the Spanish state’s response, particularly the alerts that could have prevented it. On that second line, the next step is expected to be the summons of the former government delegate in Ceuta.
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Finally, Central Investigating Court number 4 keeps José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero charged with alleged misappropriation, influence peddling, tax fraud and smuggling. Several dates are marked in the calendar: on 19 November, ten days before the vote, former SEPI Holdings director José Ángel Partearroyo will testify as a witness about his role in processing the 53-million-euro bailout granted to Plus Ultra, allegedly thanks to Zapatero’s influence, while on 30 November, a day after the elections, the former prime minister’s daughters will testify as investigated persons over their alleged collaboration in collecting kickbacks through their company Whathefav SL. Zapatero’s indictment will make itself felt in the coming weeks, as until now the former prime minister had been an electoral asset for Pedro Sánchez.
