On the bench the lawyer Rodríguez Menéndez for an alleged fraud against investors with a false oil business

MADRID, 20 Ene. (EUROPA PRESS) -

The Provincial Court of Madrid will try next Thursday the lawyer José Emilio Rodríguez Menéndez for the alleged commission of a crime of fraud against investors with an alleged false business in Buenos Aires (Argentina) of buying and selling oil.

The oral hearing has been suspended several times, the last time due to the lawyer's health. In his indictment, the prosecutor accuses him of fraud, for which he asks for four years in prison and a ten-month fine at a rate of 12 euros (3,600 euros). If he is convicted, he will have to indemnify the defrauded a total of 73,700 euros.

The lawyer for those affected, represented by Garzón Abogados, charges Rodríguez Menéndez with up to nine crimes, including criminal organization, document falsification, fraud, misappropriation and money laundering.

The crimes concurred with the aggravating circumstances of breach of trust and being a repeat offender by already having several firm convictions. The sum of prison requests reaches 42 years in prison.

The defense denies the accusations in its brief, to which Europa Press had access, as it does not conform to reality and for being "manifestly false and tendentious."

The lawyer has been sentenced twice for a crime against privacy, in 2002, and for a crime against the Treasury, in 2005. After his imprisonment was decreed, the lawyer fled the country while on prison leave and took refuge in Argentina , being arrested two months later. He entered an Argentine jail and was released.

According to the prosecutor's account, the defendant contacted I.S.M. in order to propose a business consisting of the purchase/sale and supply of oil with the state energy entity YPF in Buenos Aires given "the high profitability of the business, an activity in which, faking his contacts in Argentina, he would intervene as an intermediary and that he did with the initial intention of keeping the money".

To this end, I. S. M., A. L. E. O., C. R. C. and J. V. LA I. delivered various amounts of money up to 11,000 euros to the defendant in the defendant's office located in Madrid.

The first payment is made on July 2, 2014 with delivery to the defendant of the amount of 4,700 euros in cash. Said sums of money are delivered in order to cover the expenses for the constitution of three companies, social capital, payment of taxes, travel and other concepts.

All this "being the defendant who would legally represent said companies and would also process and manage the energy supply business project."

"These three companies would be constituted in order that through them the purchase/sale and supply of oil with the state energy entity YPF2 could be carried out," the letter states.

The prosecutor points out that the defendant, guided by the purpose of obtaining unjust enrichment, "once the amounts were received, he did not deposit them in any financial institution and kept them for himself."

The companies were not registered in the AIFP (Federal Administration of Public Revenues of the Republic of Argentina) and were not registered in the CUIT (Unique Tax Identification Code that is used in the tax system of the Republic of Argentina to be able to unequivocally identify to autonomous physical or legal persons, subject to tax).