The prosecutor in the Montoro case confronted her superiors to move the investigation forward.

MadridThe indictment of Cristóbal Montoro and members of his team at the Ministry of Finance and the law firm Equipo Económico (EE), which he founded in 2006, is the result of the persistence of the head of Tarragona's investigating court number 2, Rubén Rus Vela, and the prosecutor pursuing this case, who opened it in 2018 following the accidental discovery of emails as part of another investigation led by the Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police). This case concerns Carmen María García Cerdá, whom sources from the Prosecutor's Office consulted by ARA describe as a professional who "is passionate about the issues" and "doesn't let go." "She is a fighter against corruption without any time limits," they explain. Her determination has met with reluctance within the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office, and during the seven years of secret investigation in Tarragona, García Cerdá has seen her scope of action curtailed several times and was even fined for serious disobedience to her superior.

We must go back more than a decade to understand the scope of the case. García Cerdá joined the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office in July 2013 from the Provincial Prosecutor's Office in Valencia. A couple of months later, an initial anonymous complaint arrived pointing to an alleged pre-appointment contract from the Higher Council of Chambers of Commerce. It is from this clue that the Economic Team appears on the Anti-Corruption Office's radar. It is from the office founded by Montoro that the aforementioned body allegedly hired the firm without a public subsidy, using its influence within the Spanish PP government to secure the passage of a new chambers law. Almost four years later, in 2017, after a second anonymous complaint against EE was filed—incorporated in 2019 into the Tarragona case—García Cerdá signed a first complaint against those responsible for Equipo Económico, including some of those now facing charges—such as Ricardo Martínez Rico, president of Montoro.

Although the 22nd investigating court in Madrid admitted the complaint for administrative prevarication, embezzlement, influence peddling, and falsification of commercial documents, it was eventually dismissed in 2019. Both the investigating judge in the case, Patricia Jiménez-Al, and the judge in charge of the case, said there was sufficient evidence of a crime. At that time, the Tarragona court had already begun to unravel another thread related not to the chambers of commerce, but to gas companies after the Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police), coincidentally in another investigation, intercepted suspicious emails from the technical director of Messer Ibérica de Gasas SA regarding EE. For its part, the Economic Team is using the first file to discredit García Cerdá. In its statement reacting to the accusations, the law firm attacks the prosecutor who has them in its sights: "We consider it important to note that she has been sanctioned by her superiors for her excesses."

The confrontation within the Anti-Corruption Force

The firm founded by Montoro refers to a €1,000 fine—upheld by the Supreme Court in early July—for having acted behind the back of the chief anti-corruption prosecutor, Alejandro Luzón. According to the case file, to which ARA has had access, García Cerdán attempted to investigate the corporate emails of former senior officials, including the former Minister of Finance himself, amid suspicions of a possible disclosure of secrets—still to be detected. Messages with tax information from political opponents and journalists—. Luzón did not authorize it and ordered that part of the investigation to be shelved. The prosecutor in charge of the case resisted and forced a meeting of the Anti-Corruption leadership in September 2023 to discuss the issue. The decision, practically unanimous, was to focus solely on the main branch of the investigation into the alleged trafficking in legal documents. A few months later, the Prosecutorial Council returned to the issue.

Only one member of this leadership body of the Prosecutor's Office, in a meeting held in March 2024, sided with García Cerdá. This was Salvador Viada, at the time a Supreme Court prosecutor (now retired). In a conversation with ARA, Viada recalls that he "saw very clearly" that the emails had to be investigated because the matter was "very serious." Why was it decided to restrict his scope of action? Viada rules out that it was an attempt by Luzón to put spokes in the wheels or that political motivations were involved. The former Supreme Court prosecutor points out that they had never encountered a secret investigation that lasted so many years, and there was fear that steps could be taken that would further prolong the investigation or that would be false and lead to the annulment of the case. This "anomalous" length of secrecy is, in fact, one of the arguments EE has used, in the same statement, to claim "lack of defense" in the proceedings. However, Viada maintains that his colleagues "made a mistake" by aligning themselves with Luzón.

In fact, this Thursday it was revealed that the judge in charge of the case also does not see the crime of disclosure of secrets in Montoro's interference with private tax data and that he is focusing on the alleged trafficking of laws through EE payments.

The clash over mobile phone hacking

The clash over the emails in the Montoro case was not the only one in this investigation. Luzón also clashed with García Cerdá in 2022 over the wiretapping of the cell phones of some of those under investigation. Initially, the prosecutor in the case ruled in favor of this action, and the Catalan police were able to access the communications of four people involved (Ricardo Martínez Rico, Manuel Vicente-Tutor, Salvador Mariano Ruiz Gallud, and Covadonga Gómez Garrido). However, when her superior found out, she appealed the judicial authorization, and the Tarragona Court blocked it. All the information gathered during this period has not been used.

Sources close to the case point out that this conflict also involved an issue related to the internal balance of the Prosecutor's Office, which is governed by the principle of hierarchical dependence and in which free verses do not fit well. García Cerdá's sanction came after it was discovered that, after the decision by the Anti-Corruption leadership, she spoke with a contact in the Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police) about the emails, hoping the judicial police wouldn't let that area of the case die, which she had been barred from handling. When this action was discovered, the Prosecutor's Office opened disciplinary proceedings against her. The same sources explain that García Cerdá "frequently" disagrees and has conflicts with Luzón, who is "a highly regarded man within the institution," but more "rational" and "distant." He is also at odds over the Púnica case. García Cerdá also had a clash with his predecessor, Manuel Moix, over the Lezo case.

Despite these obstacles, and although disclosure of secrets is not one of the seven crimes for which Montoro was ultimately charged, the bulk of the investigation continued, and the prosecutor has remained involved in the case.