Seven questions with answers: guide to understanding the trial of Pedro Sánchez's brother

Madrid"One cannot allow any person, whoever they may be, to develop their professional aspirations using public resources, to the detriment of other more capable people or other more pressing needs." After a year of investigation, this was one of the conclusions that led Judge Beatriz Biedma to send David Sánchez, nine officials from the Badajoz Provincial Council, and also the then leader of the PSOE in Extremadura to trial for the crimes of prevarication and influence peddling. Popular prosecutions are requesting three years in prison for the brother of the Spanish president. Under scrutiny is the creation of his job at the Badajoz Provincial Council, which would have been created to award it to him directly, and the hiring of a friend of his who helped him "unofficially" from Moncloa.

How was his job created?

The judge maintains that the job position of David Sánchez as Coordinator of Activities for the Conservatories was created "at the request, surely, of people in his circle" and despite the initial proposals not including it. There is a key email from May 2017 – before the administrative procedure concluded – between the directors of the two conservatories which contained the link to the call for applications. The subject was El Hermanísimo, a "clear and direct" allusion to the brother of the current Spanish president: "They knew it was destined for him," summarizes the judge. When he testified, David Sánchez said that in May 2017 he was looking for a job and found the call for applications online.

What are the suspicions?

A witness stated that in June 2017, the day before the job interview, David Sánchez showed interest in an apartment in Badajoz, claiming he would move there to work for "a few months" which could be extended. According to the judge, this "reinforces the thesis" that the job was created for him. When he testified as a witness, he replied that he was conducting a "prospective" exploration and was only seeking information. At another point, at the negotiation table, the representative of the CSI-CSIF union expressed "serious doubts" about the new job: "It doesn't seem necessary to us," he said. For his part, the director of one of the conservatories complained that this position does not exist anywhere else in Spain or "in the world."

What did their job consist of?

The judge considers that, with the aim of obtaining a "personal benefit", he managed to adapt the conditions to his "personal preferences", such as not having to go to the office or being able to dedicate himself to opera. From October 2020 to October 2021 he was on leave of absence and, when he returned, he began to focus more and more on the Young Opera Project and "stopped fulfilling" the functions of his contract, which became "increasingly residual". In fact, it was so much so that the directors of the conservatories "thought he had disassociated himself from them".

What position did Pedro Sánchez hold?

The interim order that ended the investigation mentions Pedro Sánchez nine times in 78 pages. The most relevant is that one of the accused declared that it was he who, after a rally in Badajoz during the PSOE primaries, explained to him that his brother was a musician. And on the day of the job interview, two candidates were commenting that Pedro Sánchez's brother was applying.

But... where was he politically? The creation of the position first appeared on October 8, 2016, a week after Sánchez resigned as PSOE general secretary after losing the primaries. He was re-elected in May 2017, one month before David Sánchez's hiring. The judge alludes to the "creation of the job for the brother of a very important politician in the PSOE".

Who was he and what did his friend from Moncloa do?

In 2023 a new name emerged: Luis Carrero. He is a friend of David Sánchez – he refers to him as his little brother– and he worked at Moncloa. Specifically, in the Message Unit of the Department of Political Affairs, which reports to the Ministry of the Presidency. After a period of having "actively" collaborated with the Spanish president's brother "unofficially" as a "member of his team" – for example, he drafted documents or answered emails – he signed with the Badajoz Provincial Council.

It is a move that the judge finds "suspicious". In fact, half of the prison sentence that David Sánchez faces is for his hiring. There is an email between the two of them in which they "took for granted" that he would be the chosen one 23 days before the bases were published. For the judge, this is a "further step intended to satisfy the personal preferences" of David Sánchez, who used his "influence" to hire a "person of his trust".

What does the Public Prosecutor's Office say?

Just like in the case against Begoña Gómez, the Prosecutor's Office does not accuse and has long been asking for it to be dismissed. It considers that the judge makes "irrational inferences" and bases the accusation on "conjectures and hypotheses" that do not allow concluding that David Sánchez's job was created to order. In the preliminary conclusions, it alleges that the "legally established procedure" was followed, that the General Intervention of the Provincial Council of Badajoz did not detect "irregularities" and that none of the other ten applicants made any "claim or protest" about the result.

Is he accused of tax evasion?

No. The judge admitted that there are no "rational indications" to accuse David Sánchez of a crime against public finance and illicit enrichment. The Tax Agency concluded that he is a tax resident in Portugal and that this is not incompatible with being a public employee in Spain. Initially, the Civil Guard suspected an alleged increase in the value of his shares, but ended up admitting that it had been the result of confusion and a calculation error.