Palma.Lawyers acting for the Balearic government are asking for a sentence of 27 years in prison for three ex directors of the Youth and Tourism department for their part in embezzling public funds when former Partido Popular regional President Jaume Matas was in power.
The three accused - Juan Francisco Galvez, Damia Amengual, and Services and Maintenance chief Juan Francisco Gosalbez - are standing trial along with nine others.
Investigators first brought the fraud- which left the Youth and Tourism department facing bankruptcy - to light back in 2008 when the previous Socialist coalition government under Francesc Antich was in power. But it wasn't until July this year when the Balearic government, now under Partido Popular President José Ramón Bauzá, officially asked for the stiff prison sentence.
Change of guard
The change of government, said Partido Popular authority lawyers yesterday has not diminished the rigour with which the Administration wishes to pursue the case. They pointed out that Central Government demands the same prison sentence for the same crimes - that of knowingly defrauding government institutions of public money with the intention of personal gain through fraud, bribes and falsification of official documents.
The three main accused, the lawyers said citing statements by the Prosecution Counsell, conceived the idea of embezzlement and carefully planned it so that they could syphon off public money for their own ends. If the accused had been successful in their plot, said Prosecution Counsell, they would have succeeded in escaping with more than a million euros. The defendants allegedly paid themselves grossly inflated salaries and went on spending sprees.
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