The Mediator case, which has shaken Canarian politics and threatens to muddy Spanish politics three months after the municipal and regional elections on 28-M, can be summed up in a plot made up of three main characters who, using their respective positions in the sector public and their contacts, offered businessmen the possibility of obtaining benefits or favored treatment in exchange for the delivery of gifts, gifts or payments while extorting commissions from farmers on the islands to reduce sanctions or receive subsidies.
Through what the investigators’ reports reveal about the protagonists of the plot, it is possible to obtain an approximate portrait of this underworld of not very subtle corruption that connects with La Escopeta Nacional by Luis García Berlanga and the Torrente saga by Santiago Segura and that combines bribes, extortion with expensive meals and parties with alcohol, drugs and prostitution.
At the apex of the plot would be the former PSOE deputy in Congress, Juan Bernardo Fuentes Curbelo (Puerto del Rosario, 1962), a history of the party in the Canary Islands and a member of the family that controls the PSOE in Fuerteventura. The members of the plot know him as Tito Berni, although he assured the judge investigating the case that he “does not know Tito.” The judge had to release him on February 22 after taking a statement against his own criteria because the Prosecutor’s Office did not request precautionary measures against him. He resigned as a deputy on February 14.
Among other activities, Fuentes Curbelo used his status as a deputy to seduce businessmen who were interested in obtaining public contracts for whom he organized visits to the Congress of Deputies, visits that used to end in lunches, dinners and night parties in which there were plenty of alcohol, drugs and prostitution. Similar situations occurred in the Canary Islands. The businessmen were the ones who paid for these parties with costs between 3,000 and 11,000 euros.
However, the first step for the beginning of these relations was the bank transfer of 5,000 euros to the Vega de Tetir Sports Association (a soccer team from Fuerteventura) that Fuentes presided over. Other companies of the former deputy such as the Tetir Livestock and Tetir Cheeses and the Tetir Consulting and Fiscal and Accounting Consulting Juan B. Fuentes Curbelo also served for this purpose.
Francisco Espinosa Navas (Seville 1956), known in the plot as Papá, is a retired Civil Guard general, former colonel in charge of the Las Palmas Civil Guard Command and former head of the EU mission in the fight against terrorism and organized crime in the Sahel. He is the only one of the 13 investigated who remains in prison.
Investigators suspect that he was in charge of box B of the plot because of the way he kept his accounts from the documents found on his computer. In the search at his home, 61,100 euros were found in bundles of bills hidden in shoe boxes, inside a bag and even wrapped in clothing.
The general, who used the dependencies of the General Command of the Benemérita in Madrid, was, according to the judge, essential to the plot, due to his contacts and the ability to convey confidence to the businessmen he captured, those who guaranteed to stop files or receive of subsidies in exchange for bribes. He also took advantage of his contacts in the Canary Islands to put Canarian businessmen in contact with other higher-level ones to propose projects in exchange for favors. He asked one of these for an invoice to pretend to his wife that he was going to the islands to give a conference, when in reality he was going to visit his lover in Fuerteventura, which he refers to in WhatsApp messages as “the flying pussy”. . All paid by the employer.
Marco Antonio Navarro Tacoronte (Gáldar, 1975) is known as the mediator, gives the case its name and is at the epicenter of the plot despite the fact that it was he who denounced the facts. He has a criminal record for theft, robbery with violence, fraud and falsification of public documents for which he has been sentenced to more than ten years in prison.
He decided to denounce the plot and hand over his two mobile phones with compromising information to the judge when he was arrested following a false complaint for fraud by the then Sports Director of the Cabildo de Tenerife, Ángel Luis Pérez, who thus wanted to justify to his partner some expenses of 2,750 in luxury items.
The researchers attribute to Tacoronte the role of intermediary between the businessmen and the then socialist deputy and the general of the Civil Guard. The businessmen were both peninsular, who had an interest in entering the Canary Islands, and islanders, particularly cattle ranchers, whom the plot extorted in exchange for withdrawing or reducing sanctions or threatened to exclude them from subsidies if they did not pay. The mediator also delivered the cash that was collected from the businessmen to the other two members of the plot.
Navarro has a family linked to the PSOE and has held public office in the archipelago, hence his friendship with Juan Bernardo Fuentes. The mediator has pointed out that he had his own office in the Government of the Canary Islands together with the director of Livestock, without being an official and that he was already leaving public offices in the midst of a pandemic, even when access controls were exhaustive due to the covid.
In addition to implicating the former socialist deputy and the retired Civil Guard general, Tacoronte, in a radio interview, assured that he has worked as an intermediary with the previous government of the Canary Islands Coalition and has threatened the current president of the PP in the Canary Islands and candidate in the elections of May 28, Manuel Domínguez, with “taking the City of Los Realejos for a walk” and the alleged efforts that he claims to have made for that Consistory.
Taishet Fuentes (Puerto del Rosario, 1962) is the nephew of the former socialist deputy whom he took over as director of Livestock of the Government of the Canary Islands when he went to Madrid to take up the seat in 2019. He was dismissed in June 2022 after “losing confidence” of the Government of the Canary Islands. At that time, his departure from the Executive was justified by mismanagement in the livestock crisis. However, the PSOE had recently appointed him to head the electoral list for the Antigua City Council on May 28.
His function would be the same as that of his uncle and he would have removed an official who was in charge of leading inspection tasks, due to the discontent of the ranchers. Taishet also participated in parties with prostitutes. An audio message from Taishet Fuentes is quite explicit in this regard: “They are here at the door of the hotel with me. They are tremendous. They are tremendous. The four of us are already going up.”
Miguel Ángel Robayna (Puerto de la Cruz, 1973) as sole administrator of the construction company Hispano Robysa SLU offered to provide legal coverage for different payments made by businessmen issuing fictitious invoices and trying to launder the considerations.
José Santiago Suárez Estévez is a Valencian businessman who owns the drone company Asesoramiento y servicios de drones, SL and a personal friend of retired General Espinosa Navas. His company was awarded four contracts from the International Foundation for Public Administration and Policies for Ibero-America, dependent on the Government of Spain, for 2.3 million euros for the project of Rapid Action Surveillance and Intervention Groups in the Sahel, in the years 2020 and 2021 when General Espinosa led missions in the Sahel, as in charge of a gendarme training project in the area (in the Garsi-Sahel project).
Before Judge Espinosa Navas, he denied that he favored Suárez Estévez and indicated that the administration of the project in the Sahel was only concerned with “operational aspects” because the “economic and contracting” aspects were carried out by the International and Ibero-American Foundation for Administration and Policies Public (FIIAPP), chaired by the first vice-president Nadia Calviño.
Raül Gómez Rojo (Madrid, 1966) is a civil engineer and owner of the Civil Twin Consulting company, among others. He was one of the last to enter the plot and his objective, according to the investigators, was to create a subsidiary of his company within the special Canary Islands zone and obtain contracts thanks to other investigators. He would also participate in the deception to attract interested investors to obtain licenses in an ‘easy’ way.
Also featured in the plot is the Catalan couple formed by Esteban Banús and María Inmaculada Roca, who live in the Canary Islands and have different commercial companies linked to the primary sector and who, according to the investigation reports, “wanted to obtain the license to expand the farm and obtaining subsidies, as well as obtaining new commercial contracts for their commercial brand Leche Sandra” (which they aspired to place in Canarian hospitals) and the products of their Cogrami Canarias distillery.
Cheesemaker from Fuerteventura. He wanted to regularize the facilities of his company before retiring to sell them or give them to his children. He paid the plot in cash.
Born in Ciudad Real, Antonio Bautista wanted to establish his company Cleanergetic Insular, dedicated to installing solar panels in the Canary Islands Special Zone and paid the plot to achieve it.
