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ILLEGAL HOUSES IN ÁGUILAS – MAN QUESTIONED
Staff Reporter / 2009-12-16 13:56:16
Trinitario Casanova, The Alicante businessman who was the original promoter for the development project to build a golf course resort on protected land and who was on a trip to the United States last month when his arrest was ordered over the Zerrichera case in Águilas, is now back in Spain and has been questioned by police. It is reported that he has denied to detectives that he paid any commissions to have the land reclassified to allow the development to go ahead.
Officers investigating the case at their headquarters in Madrid have questioned him concerning three invoices which police now suspect to be false and which were, it is suspected, used to cover up large sums of money withdrawn from his accounts. The amounts of the three invoices are given as 9, 5 and 2.9 million €, money which detectives suspect may have been used to bribe politicians.
The reason for the suspicion is because the third amount of 2.9 million€ was withdrawn two days before a council meeting in Águilas. A meeting that approved the development project at La Zerrichera in the autumn of 2005 but Casanova is reported to have told officers last Monday that all three amounts were related to payments made to three businesses who were involved in the sale of the site at La Zerrichera to a real estate company. The case continues and we wait to hear if Casanova will be called in for further questioning by the investigating judge.
British arrested over illegal properties
In Llíber, a small inland village of the Marina Alta, six suspects have been arrested over the illegal construction and sale of more than 300 properties built on protected land which at present as just about 1,000 inhabitants, included in the list of suspects is a British man, who is named as Trevor B.
José Mas, the Partido Popular´s Mayor of Llíber during the period in question, between 2000 and 2003, has also been charged with planning crimes in a case which is linked to this investigation for allowing the construction on rustic land to go ahead through licences issued for a different type of construction. Along with Jose Mas is the ex municipal surveyor, who sources said was responsible for giving a guarantee to the purchasers that the property they had decided to invest their money in was legal. The former planning councillor was also charged in that separate case, but has since died.
Others charged along with the British man include a German man, Michael W., and his sister, Traude, and a well-known constructor from Xàbia, Miguel M. The names of the remaining two suspects have yet to be confirmed but all six are accused of committing fraud by selling the properties to mainly foreign clients without informing the purchasers of their illegal situation and they are also of planning crimes.
Tags: Illegal House, Spain, Águilas
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