Corruption charges/ Former Spanish Transport Minister remanded in custody

2025-11-27 19:51:00, Kosova & Bota CNA

José Luis Ábalos became the first sitting member of parliament to be jailed on Thursday. Supreme Court Judge Leopoldo Puente ordered the imprisonment of the former Transport Minister and his former advisor, Koldo García, for an alleged corruption scheme centered on the purchase of face masks during the pandemic, according to official Supreme Court sources.

The judge made this decision after being asked to do so by the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office and private prosecutors (led by the People's Party, PP) during a hearing held at the high court to review the precautionary measures previously imposed on the former minister and his assistant (two-weekly appearance before the judge, confiscation of passports and travel ban).

At 6:09 p.m., the two were taken to the Soto del Real prison in Madrid, according to prison sources.

Thursday's hearing confirmed the worst fears for Ábalos and the PSOE. Eight days after former Organization Secretary Santos Cerdán was released after spending almost five months in detention, his predecessor in that position took the opposite path on Thursday.

The judge, who had so far rejected private prosecutors' requests to imprison the former Minister of Transport, has now taken this step after the Public Prosecutor's Office, for the first time, also requested it, arguing that there is a risk of flight, one of the requirements set out by law for ordering detention.

The investigating judge had already warned of a growing risk of flight as the trial date approached, and the hearing is now imminent after Judge Puente proposed on November 3 that Ábalos, Koldo García, and intermediary Víctor de Aldama be put on trial for the alleged corruption scheme centered on the purchase and sale of face masks during the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to the judge, the risk of flight for both is now extreme and cannot be mitigated by the measures currently imposed on them.

The magistrate attributes to the former minister and his former associate the commission of the possible crimes of membership in a criminal organization, bribery, insider trading, use of influence and embezzlement. In the case of Ábalo, the judge orders that the court secretary inform the President of the Congress of Deputies of the decision because it affects the personal situation of the protected official, who belongs to the Mixed Group.

It will now be up to the House of Representatives to decide on the consequences of Ábalos' detention. It is expected that the Congressional Bureau will act on its own initiative, after receiving notice from the Supreme Court, and suspend him from his duties./ CNA, translated by El Pais