Vilaplana left the parking lot an hour after finishing lunch with Mazón

ValenciaAt 7:47 p.m. This is the time that journalist Maribel Vilaplana paid for parking after having lunch at the El Ventorro restaurant in Valencia with the then-acting head of the Valencian government, Carlos Mazón, on the day of the storm. That is, an hour after finishing lunch, around 6:30 p.m. The investigating magistrate was able to confirm this on Tuesday after receiving the bank card information with which the journalist paid for parking, showing that the amount was €15.10. Vilaplana's submission of documentation was necessary because Interparking, the company that manages the business, informed the court that license plate data is deleted after one year and that the entry and exit images to the underground parking garage cannot be accessed because they are deleted one month after being recorded. The only option was to cross-reference the bank card data with the amount paid. The company was able to provide the number of vehicles that left the parking lot between 6:35 p.m. and 8:00 p.m., paying by card. There were a total of 38. Given that Vilaplana arrived before 3:00 p.m. and left after 7:00 p.m., analyzing the exits narrowed the search to three scenarios. The first was that she left at 7:12 p.m. after paying slightly more than €19. The second was that she left at 7:18 p.m. after paying €17.55. And finally, the third was that she left at 7:47 p.m. at a cost of €15.10, thanks to the five-hour parking offer. This is almost an hour after she left the controversial lunch at El Ventorro, according to Vilaplana and the restaurant owner, and it calls into question what both the media personality and the PP leader have said so far. Another point that remains unclear is where the then-president of Valencia changed his clothes. The journalist testified before the judge that in the private room, Mazón asked her permission to remove his tie and jacket and put on a yellow sweater. This account contradicts the restaurant owner's statement, who asserted that the head of the Valencian government left the meal wearing a jacket.

According to her testimony to the judge, Vilaplana strolled leisurely with the president of the Generalitat between El Ventorro and the parking garage. They chatted briefly near the entrance, and then she went to get her car. She had the ticket in the car and went down to retrieve it. Once inside, she properly closed her laptop after the communication session she claims to have had with the president during lunch, reviewed some notes she had taken, and replied to a few personal WhatsApp messages. Immediately afterward, she went back upstairs, paid, and returned to her car. Regarding the time that elapsed between saying goodbye to Mazón and leaving the parking garage, she stated that it was "between 10 and 15 minutes."

During her testimony, and in response to the judge's questions, who asked if the president seemed relaxed after leaving, Vilaplana answered "yes," and gave as an example that upon leaving the restaurant they talked about football and that she, a board member of Levante, suggested he attend the match. "We left [El Ventorro] normally and walked around normally because the parking lot was right next door," she recounted. She also noted that she "wasn't in a hurry" and that she "didn't sense any hurry from him either," so they continued "talking about football." In fact, an hour passed between leaving the restaurant and paying for the parking ticket, even though the distance between El Ventorro and the parking lot is just over 200 meters.

The journalist also explained that it was in the early hours of the morning when she called Mazón to ask him not to make her name public, and that in that conversation he told her that what had happened was "very big, very serious" and assured her that he hadn't known "anything" before. Specifically, she asked him if he was aware of what was happening while they were eating, and he replied, "How could I know?" Regarding the phone calls again, she recounted that two days later the president told her he was very sorry, but that "his name should be released because he was under a lot of pressure, and that it was best to cut off all contact," words that triggered "a panic attack" in her.

An even longer walk

The time Vilaplana paid for the parking ticket further extends the time the journalist and the politician strolled leisurely after lunch at Ventorro—which theoretically ended at 6:45 p.m.—even though, at that moment, most of the deaths from the disaster were occurring. At the Cecopio (emergency dispatch center), the Minister of Justice and the Interior, Salomé Pradas, was preparing to call the head of the Consell (Valencian Government), who wasn't answering. Specifically, at 7:10 p.m. and 7:36 p.m. The politician from Alicante didn't answer his subordinate's call until 7:43 p.m. During his appearance before the Congress of Deputies last week, Mazón said he didn't know why Pradas hadn't answered the phone. However, he offered a hypothesis: "Perhaps she was walking and had her phone in her backpack."

The new information provided by the journalist leaves open the question of whether, after saying goodbye to Vilaplana, Mazón stopped anywhere before going to the Palau de la Generalitat—the distance between the parking lot and the Valencian government headquarters can be covered on foot in 10 to 15 minutes—and from there, traveled. To try to clarify these doubts, the judge has summoned his bodyguards and driver as witnesses and has requested from the Generalitat the recordings showing Mazón's arrival at the Emergency Center, including the exact time. The judge argues that this evidence is "relevant" to analyze Salomé Pradas's "decision-making process" on the day of the tragedy. In this regard, it highlights that the figure of the head of the Consell has the "directive and coordination" functions of all members of the Valencian government, as indicated by the Provincial Court of Valencia on October 16, functions that "cannot be limited to those that he could exercise in person, but must also extend to those exercised by telephone."