Mazón's chief of staff claims to have lost the WhatsApp messages from the day of the DANA storm.

ValenciaThe chief of staff of the still-acting Valencian president, Carlos Mazón, José Manuel Cuenca, has stated that he has lost all the WhatsApp messages he exchanged on October 29th of last year, when the DANA storm caused the deaths of 229 people in the Valencian Community alone. He told this to the investigating magistrate on Wednesday, according to sources present at his testimony as a witness, as reported by ARA. According to Cuenca, who holds the position of regional secretary of the President's Cabinet, he changed his mobile phone in July because his device was full, and since he didn't have up-to-date backups, he lost the messages. When asked how long the loss covered, he cited a period of between 9 and 12 months.

Mazón's right-hand man also confirmed that the acting head of the Valencian government decided to go to the Cecopio (the regional emergency response center) at 7:34 p.m. when the regional secretary for Infrastructure and Transport, Javier Sendra, explained that the central facilities of the Valencia metropolitan area metro were flooding. This is the moment after which Mazón resumed his calls—the last one had been at 6:57 p.m.—and after a 37-minute disconnection during which he walked with journalist Maribel Vilaplana from the El Ventorro restaurant in Valencia to the parking lot where he reportedly said goodbye to her. At 7:43 p.m., he called the former Minister of Justice and the Interior, who had called him at 7:10 p.m. and again at 7:36 p.m. without Mazón answering.

He also detailed that around 5 p.m., he raised the possibility of traveling to Utiel—where the rains had been heaviest since 1 p.m.—with the then-Regional Minister Salomé Pradas after a meeting with the Civil Protection Coordination Center (CECOPIO), which he believed would be brief. However, the head of Emergency Services warned him that Emergency Services were having trouble reaching the area.

When asked by the judge if he knew about the president's lunch with Vilaplana, Cuenca said that he "knew who he was having lunch with." "I suggested this lunch, just as I did with three or four other potential candidates for the management of À Punt," he explained. "I arranged the lunch, and I knew who he was having lunch with, where he was, and I had him located," he added. The high-ranking official described El Ventorro as the establishment where Mazón "holds lunches with Valencian and national media outlets and meetings of the Valencian Community's People's Party (PP)."

The chief of staff also explained that Mazón "doesn't like having his bodyguard with him all the time." Although he didn't witness the events, he ventured a guess as to the reason for the withdrawal of the president's security detail: "They would accompany him, and then he would tell them that when lunch was over, he would go to the Palau. That's the usual procedure. Sometimes we've arrived close to his house, and he releases them," he noted. The high-ranking official also specified that Mazón uses his "old" phone. "He's never had a second line," he explained.

[We are working to expand this information]