Leire Díez's plot maneuvered to pressure Marchena and be able to "successfully conclude" the amnesty
A document from the investigation file details an agreement with Villarejo to obtain "evidence that would demonstrate the judge's corruption".
MadridThe alleged PSOE plot led by Santos Cerdán and Leire Díez also showed interest in the amnesty law. A 372-page Guardia Civil report, to which ARA has had access, contains references to the norm. Specifically, the Central Operative Unit (UCO) found a Word document prepared in November 2024 by the so-called plumber of the PSOE that alluded directly to José Manuel Villarejo. It stated that the retired commissioner of the Spanish police, who these days sits on the defendant's bench for the Kitchen case, "has the evidence that would prove the corruption" of Manuel Marchena, who was the president of the Procés trial and was one of the judges who blocked the amnesty for Oriol Junqueras, Jordi Turull, Dolors Bassa and Raül Romeva (Carles Puigdemont, Toni Comín and Lluís Puig were also not granted amnesty by decision of Pablo Llarena).
Another Word document, from January 2025, titled "state of affairs" and also prepared by Leire Díez, detailed that in the summer of 2024 they had reached an "agreement" with Villarejo so that he would provide them with "all the documentation that has not come to light". Among this documentation, there would be "audios and payments involving" Marchena and the "role of the PP" in the patriotic police: "It involves the entire leadership of Rajoy's government and even Feijóo buying the Galician elections of 2012", he explained in writing. "The recordings pending delivery are truly explosive", he concluded.
The agreement document in question, which is also in the report, specifies that there would be an "exchange of data" to "thoroughly cleanse the deep state". Villarejo would offer his "personal archive documented with unreleased audios, notes, and complete reports" and, in return, would benefit from a "reconsideration" of his judicial situation. The same paper details three meetings that the retired commissioner and Leire Díez would have had on July 30, August 9, and August 26, 2024. Before the second meeting, for example, Antonio García Cabrera, Villarejo's lawyer, urged the PSOE's plumber to meet: "You have to agree amongst yourselves. He is fed up with so much beating and doesn't believe in carrots".
Months later, in January and February 2025, Leire Díez asked Cabrera to call prosecutor César de Rivas, who is in charge of the Kitchen case. But he didn't take it well and the PSOE "plumber" had to resort to higher authorities. Thus, she informed Villarejo's lawyer that he would be received by the State Attorney General, Álvaro García Ortiz, on February 19. According to another document, the meeting was to serve to accept a prison sentence that did not involve imprisonment and an economic fine that would not prevent him from continuing his life. To achieve this, Villarejo had to "collaborate with the Prosecutor's Office to clarify" the facts, "unravel the rest of the cases created for the victims and purge the rest of the responsibilities".
A third document titled "Catalonia Actions" outlined the roadmap: "One of the obstacles to being more agile in successfully concluding the amnesty issue is the Supreme Court. [...] It can be said that we are progressing, I believe we are in the final sprint before the end of the stage so that the agreement with Villarejo and Paco Martínez is executed and we can get Villarejo's documentation, especially that which affects the Supreme Court, judges and prosecutors," he stated.
Likewise, he considered it a "priority objective" to close the Congressional investigation commission on Operation Catalonia to bring the conclusions to the Prosecutor's Office. He also spoke of prosecutor José Grinda, who was in charge of the 3% case, the case against Carles Puigdemont for Aigües de Girona, or the case that led to the closure of Banca Privada d'Andorra (BPA). The document indicated that they would file a complaint against him for the "irregularities" that had been uncovered and a "pedophilia file" that affected him.
Request to Francisco Martínez
Precisely, the report also includes a conversation between Leire Díez and Francisco Martínez, who was number 2 in the Ministry of the Interior with Jorge Fernández Díaz as Secretary of State for Security. The PSOE "plumber" expressed to him the intention of reaching an agreement with him: "You have to decide which is the right side of history. Help to unravel all this or let it continue to get more complicated. You are a weak link in all this, and it's not fair because you had people above you".
He put on the table an agreement with the Prosecutor's Office "so that things end up with as little as possible". That is, without prison and trying to end it "as soon as possible". "We have to negotiate. We are starting a path that is not as easy as going to sales. But it doesn't have much more of a problem either," he explained. And he justified that the best way was to agree with the Prosecutor's Office because his case could not be included in the amnesty: "My people were seeing how to do it to get you out of all this. Not in this amnesty, because it didn't fit".