The former commissioner José Manuel Villarejo attended an appointment on February 6, 2017 called by the lawyer and former judge Baltasar Garzón in which he held a meeting of approximately 30 minutes that he fully recorded. At the meeting, Villarejo told him that his friend and participant in meals and operations, the businessman Adrian de la Joya, had made a trip in connection with “a history of Guatemala & rdquor; and, in cryptic language, he spoke of sending data “to the Colombian & rdquor ;, referring to the prosecutor Ivan Velasquezby the United Nations International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG), to deny the accusations of corruption against the Spanish shipping company Angel Perez Maurawhich led that country to request his extradition to Spain for the alleged payment of an illegal commission of 30 million euros. Said payment would have been destined for the former Guatemalan president Otto Perez Molina and its vice president Roxana Baldettifor awarding it the construction and operation of a private container terminal in Puerto Quetzal (TCQ).
That February 6, 2017, one day before traveling to New York with his friend De la Joya – who had made an appointment with the lobbyist Paul Manafortwho chaired the president’s election campaign committee donald trumpbetween June and August 2016 – the former commissioner drove his black Land Rover to Garzón’s law firm.
In his meticulous agenda, Villarejo put the following entry that day: ‘Balta. Avd. Menéndez Pelayo 87, 1ºA – See us at 18:30-he called. Below are other appointments, among them with Adrián de la Joya (Joy) and José Luis Olivera (Oli) the main commissioner who directed the Intelligence Center against Terrorism and Organized Crime (CITCO) and former head of the Economic Crime Unit and Prosecutor (UDEF).
Garzón, according to sources consulted by EL PERIÓDICO, managed a commission from Villarejo to testify before the justice of the principality of Andorra, as a witness in the complaint of Higini Cierco and his family, shareholders of Banca Privada de Andorra (BPA) for an alleged crime of coercion against Villarejo’s archenemy: the commissioner Marcelino Martin-Blasformer head of Internal Affairs of the Spanish Police.
Before beginning the conversation, Villarejo left his mobile phone in the hands of an employee of the firm, who took it to his office. The transcript referring to this topic is as follows:
Balthazar Garzon: I’ll take up a little time Pepe, then we’ll talk about other things. The data that you gave me the photocopy of that can be sent to a destination, can someone send it to me? The problem they have is that they can’t, it’s that they aren’t formal.
Villarejo: In what sense? what do you need? An association, or someone?
BG: Someone get it there so they can expedite this, I don’t even know how they’re going to use it. The problem is that they received some photocopies. Of course, they tell me either the person or people or someone who can send this, I don’t know how they are going to use it or stop using it, but the problem is that since they got some photocopies, what a formula.
V: The same association that has tried to sue me… That association sent it to the prosecutor of the National Court, to the attorney general… To everyone. The last copy is that, there were no more, we would have to find a way to recover it. Complicated right?
BG: No, it is to send a dispatch with the same date telling you that I am attaching this…
V: And I make it come to you
BG: In the same way.
V: The original is signed and taken away and that’s it.
BG: That could be.
V: count on it
BG: The only thing is that I will tell you the date
In another part of the audio, after talking about the Andorran Private Banking and the screenshot that Martín Blas obtained from an employee of said bank on the account of Jordi Pujol i Soley (“They offered the turkey 500,000 euros and they paid him 50,000”, points out Villarejo). Villarejo, indeed, testified as a witness before a rogatory commission from Andorra while he was already in prison, on March 19, 2019, from a court in Arganda del Rey.
After speaking about journalistic leaks, in particular from the commissioner Enrique García Castaño, aka El Gordowhom Garzón would represent on the occasion of his arrest in the Kitchen room (‘Tandem case’), on July 11, 2018, the lawyer and former judge asks:
BG: How about Adrian? How is he? [se refiere al amigo de Villarejo e intermediario Adrián de la Joya]
V: Motherfucker, motherfucker Let’s see if we see each other one day. I’ll be here next week [de regreso del viaje de a Estados Unidos]. Find yourself a day and let’s eat [comer]. You have seen that he is a very funny character. He knows everyone.
BG: I also tell you the date.
V: Send me a ‘watsapp’. I prepare a letter and send it to you. and you send it to them, you tell them that we are ready
BG: The Asociation.
V: To travel, to ratify in court.
BG: Perfect.
V: And if it can be used for you to hit a squeeze. Furthermore, I know that Adrián, returning to such [a Adrián] I know that he had traveled to Guatemala, do you remember, that story, do you remember, to Guatemala, I don’t know what. [Es una referencia la extradición del empresario naviero español que había pagado a Villarejo 7,5 millones de euros de una factura total de 10 millones para impedirla]
BG: He did not speak to me about it again. She said she was going to call me, but never again.
V: Well I do not know. But, you know, he has his lawyers here, who don’t want to. More than anything, what I imagine was that Adrián’s idea was given the proximity that you had with these people, with this Colombian…
BG: Yes Yes.
V: with the colombian [se refiere al fiscal Iván Velásquez, presidente de la CIGIP de Guatemala que al parecer había intervenido en la acusación de corrupción contra el empresario Pérez Maura] and such [decirle] that this guy [Pérez Maura]It has nothing to do, well I don’t know, that you did something.
BG: That is put together well, a dossier is made, it is delivered. It’s how you have to do these things.
V: Completely. How to do them. I tell him.
BG: There are times when it is to chat and other times to put point by point and show that it is not relevant at all.
V: Do you need something of something?
BG: It was to tell you what they had asked me to see how the subject could arrive.
V: What you want. I tell you, right now.
BG: Well, we have a history of… cone.
V: On the subject of Russia, Adrián has the best contacts in the world. And now in the United States with the new administration the best contacts in the world. When I, hey, come on, we’ll meet to eat and paper and pencil and see what we can do.
BG: As long as you don’t take me to the head of state of Belarus! [Alexandr Lukashenko , presidente].
V: LOL. It’s true, he’s very friendly [de De la Joya].
BG: And a dictator.
V: Don’t fuck with me, neither do these people nowadays.
BG: Stop kidding.
V: Trunk. Thanks, we’ll stay on that.
Villarejo’s mobile phone is returned
V: Thank you. Let’s see, boom boom. It didn’t ring, did it?
“No,” says an employee.
V: Nobody loves me – the ex-commissioner leaves.
Villarejo sold Pérez Maura (due to his Spanish status, he was not extradited) that Garzón’s intervention in negotiations in the National Court, among others, with the then prosecutor Dolores Delgado -current partner of the lawyer and former judge-, that in order to avoid extradition in 2016 and 2017 required an advance of one million euros. Pérez Maura, arrested and accused in the case – the so-called piece 4 or PIT – declared that he was convinced that Villarejo deceived him and that Garzón had no intervention in his case. De la Joya, in turn, declared to the judge that Villarejo deceived Pérez-Maura with the name of Garzón, whom he referred to as ‘El Mago’, to inflate the bill by one million euros. The Guatemalan commissioner, Velásquez, declared that he had never had any contact with Garzón, De la Joya or Delgado. The Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office also denied certain information related to Delgado and Garzón.
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Waiter He already flatly denied in 2019 his participation in the Pérez-Maura issue. “Mr. Baltasar Garzón knows Mr. Villarejo and has never denied it. The proposals that he has made or claimed to make, either did not exist or did not materialize.” He also said that “no recording can exist in which the voice of Baltasar Garzón has been captured and that refers to the so-called Pit project, to which he is absolutely alien & rdquor ;.
EL PERIÓDICO contacted Garzón regarding the audio that is published today, to offer him to listen to the recording. “I have no interest in hearing any recordings. Because if I did, I would be contributing to spreading what I think is criminal,” the lawyer pointed out.