José Luis Bárcenas Gutiérrez (born 22 October 1957) is a Spanish politician who served as party treasurer of Spain's
Partido Popular (PP, People's Party) and a
senator. Formerly a key player in his party's accounts department,
since 2009 he has been embroiled in political corruption scandals. In 2018 he was sentenced to a 33 year prison term and a €44 million euro fine for his role in the
Gürtel trial.
Career
Luis Bárcenas started working in the People's Party accounts department in 1990, and he became the chief administrator of the party in 1993. In 2008, the president of the party,
Mariano Rajoy
Mariano Rajoy Brey (; born 27 March 1955) is a Spanish politician who served as Prime Minister of Spain from 2011 to 2018, when a vote of no confidence ousted his government. On 5 June 2018, he announced his resignation as People's Party lead ...
, personally chose him as Treasurer to replace
Álvaro Lapuerta. He pursued a parallel career as a politician, and in 2004 and 2008, he was elected to represent
Cantabria
Cantabria (, also , , Cantabrian: ) is an autonomous community in northern Spain with Santander as its capital city. It is called a ''comunidad histórica'', a historic community, in its current Statute of Autonomy. It is bordered on the east ...
in the Senate.
His time as treasurer was short, as he "temporarily" resigned in 2009 when his implication in the
Gürtel scandal became too much of a public embarrassment for the party.
Bárcenas stepped down from the Senate in 2010, and his resignation as treasurer was made definitive. Until early 2013, he nonetheless retained access to a private office at the PP headquarters and continued to receive payments from the party equivalent to his salary, under circumstances which are disputed.
In 2011 the case against him was put on hold because of uncertainty regarding the identification of individuals described by initials or an alias (it had been claimed that the alias "Luis el cabrón" referred to Bárcenas). However, the case was reopened in 2012 and he was accused of "
tax fraud
Tax evasion is an illegal attempt to defeat the imposition of taxes by individuals, corporations, trusts, and others. Tax evasion often entails the deliberate misrepresentation of the taxpayer's affairs to the tax authorities to reduce the taxp ...
and of receiving illegal payments".
The controversy around him further flared up in January 2013, when the Swiss authorities informed the Gürtel investigation that he held a
Swiss bank account
Banking in Switzerland dates to the early eighteenth century through Switzerland's merchant trade and has, over the centuries, grown into a complex, regulated, and international industry. Banking is seen as Culture of Switzerland, emblematic of ...
that had contained €22 million.
(It later emerged that he controlled significant further funds in that country). Additionally, he admitted using the 2012
tax amnesty
Tax amnesty allows taxpayers to voluntarily disclose and pay tax owing in exchange for avoiding tax evasion penalties. It is a limited-time opportunity for a specified group of taxpayers to pay a defined amount, in exchange for forgiveness of a t ...
voted by the PP to legalize €10 million hidden through a Uruguayan company.
Bárcenas papers
In 2013 Spain's two main dailies, ''
El Mundo'' (center-right) and ''
El País'' (center-left), alleged that the PP had used unofficial parallel accounting to hide
slush money from illegal donations.
Two former treasurers, Bárcenas and his predecessor Lapuerta, allegedly used these illegal donations in part "to make under-the-table payments to PP leaders".
The donations in question appeared to contravene party financing laws on two counts: first, for exceeding the 60,000-euro limit for any one individual or company; second, many alleged donors were involved in the construction sector and were simultaneously being awarded government contracts. However, there were indications that measures had been taken to keep donations within the letter of the law.
''El País'' published facsimiles of handwritten "secret ledgers" (purportedly in Bárcenas' hand) suggesting that
Mariano Rajoy
Mariano Rajoy Brey (; born 27 March 1955) is a Spanish politician who served as Prime Minister of Spain from 2011 to 2018, when a vote of no confidence ousted his government. On 5 June 2018, he announced his resignation as People's Party lead ...
, the
Prime Minister of Spain
The prime minister of Spain, officially president of the Government ( es, link=no, Presidente del Gobierno), is the head of government of Spain. The office was established in its current form by the Constitution of Spain, Constitution of 1978 a ...
,
María Dolores de Cospedal
María Dolores Cospedal García (born 13 December 1965) is a Spanish politician. A member of the People's Party (PP), she served as President of Castile-La Mancha from 2011 to 2015 and as Minister of Defence of the Government of Spain from 201 ...
, the Secretary-General of the People's Party, and many other high ranking PP officials, received undeclared money.
Initially all implicated politicians, including Bárcenas, strongly denied any wrongdoing.
However, in July 2013, shortly after Bárcenas' imprisonment, ''El Mundo'' reported that Bárcenas accepted that there had been irregular funding of the People's Party.
There has been speculation that the money Bárcenas kept in Switzerland was connected to party funding. Such a connection has been denied by Bárcenas and the People's Party,
but has been supported by the testimony of
Francisco Correa. Bárcenas has said that the money in question came from his own business interests. One of these interests was claimed to be art dealing, supposedly a cash-rich activity.
Imprisonment, release on bail and trial
Facing a range of charges including tax fraud and money-laundering, on 27 June 2013, Bárcenas was sent to prison pending trial.
Spain: Judge jails former ruling party treasurer."
AP Online
The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. newspa ...
. Press Association, Inc. 2013. Retrieved 9 Jul. 2013 via HighBeam Research
HighBeam Research was a paid search engine and full text online archive owned by Gale, a subsidiary of Cengage, for thousands of newspapers, magazines, academic journals, newswires, trade magazines, and encyclopedias in English. It was head ...
(subscription required). The decision not to grant bail at that time was taken by judge Pablo Ruz to "avoid the risk of flight and ensure the preservation of sources of evidence".
He was released on bail in January 2015. Judge Ruz had announced the previous summer that he was in a position to proceed against 45 Gürtel suspects, including Bárcenas.
Because of the size of the case (Gürtel is described in Spanish as a ''macrojuicio'' or "mega-trial"), it was divided into different "epochs". The trial began in October 2016 with 1999-2005 as the epoch under investigation. Verdicts in respect of these initial proceedings were announced in May 2018. On 24 May 2018 Bárcenas was given a 33-year prison sentence, while his wife Rosalía Iglesias was given a 15-year sentence.
Personal life
Bárcenas is married to Rosalía Iglesias Villar, who was also sentenced to a prison term in May 2018.
The couple's son, Guillermo, is a musician, known for his participation in a group called Taburete.
Media portrayal
Bárcenas was played by the actor Pedro Casablanc in the 2015 film '' B, la película''.
Casablanc's performance was nominated for the Goya Award for Best Actor
The Goya Award for Best Actor (Spanish: ''Premio Goya a la mejor interpretación masculina protagonista'') is one of the Goya Awards, Spain's principal national film awards.
Actors that won or were nominated for this category have had a significa ...
.
References
External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Barcenas, Luis
Living people
Members of the Senate of Spain
People from Huelva
People's Party (Spain) politicians
Spanish art dealers
Spanish prisoners and detainees
1957 births
Comillas Pontifical University alumni
Spanish politicians convicted of crimes