The High Court of Justice of the Valencian Community (TSJCV) upheld Carmen Gómez (PP), Torrevieja’s former councillor for Contracting, Personnel, Parks and Gardens, and Urban Cleaning, seven-year ban from public office for administrative misconduct in the management of the Mediterranean VIII Employment Workshop. In the same decision, the director of the same workshop, who had been sentenced to three and a half years of disqualification following the trial at the Provincial Court in July 2025, was acquitted.
The former councillor, who was recently convicted of malfeasance in the case of Acciona’s emergency cleaning plan without a contract, may appeal the decision to the Supreme Court.
What was investigated?
The study focused on the project to establish La Siesta’s main park, which received €1.49 million in mixed finance (€362,642 in regional government subsidies and the remaining from the City Council). Activities began abruptly in December 2014, at the end of Mayor Eduardo Dolón’s (PP) first term and on the eve of the 2015 municipal election. The project lacked a construction plan and a procurement file, and orders for supplies and works were split into smaller, unsigned contracts to avoid the legal procedures needed by the project’s scale. The verdict by the High Court of Justice of the Valencian Community (TSJCV) confirms that the former councilwoman informally and directly provided services and works worth €232,000 to seven companies between January and May 2015, without a valid contract.
The incoming left-wing governing team in the City Council reported the incidents in 2016, which were then examined by the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office.
The Resource
The defence of the former councilwoman, who served for more than seven years, filed an appeal with the Provincial Court, citing a number of issues. They maintained that the inquiry was done outside of the legal timetable for the case—a point also highlighted during the trial—because the final extension expired on January 23rd, 2022, and the truncated procedure was not transformed to a more official one until August of that year. The court dismissed this claim, noting that the 2020 Criminal Procedure Law change states that investigation acts ordered before to the expiration of the term remain legal even if received later.
Copy from the prosecutor
The court also questioned the “predetermination of the ruling” in a single paragraph, citing verbatim excerpts from the prosecutor’s brief. The court views this as a mere stylistic issue with no legal significance, and that the challenged expressions, such as “knowing the illegality of their actions,” were part of a coherent factual account that accurately described the events of the irregular contracting, and that their presence did not impede an independent assessment of the evidence.
Evidentiary
The former councilwoman’s counsel also argued that the sentence lacked empirical foundation because it stated that she was “responsible for the way she proceeded” without specifying how she acted.
The three judges of the TSJCV’s Civil and Criminal Chambers, on the other hand, place a high value on the consistent testimony of a representative of one of the companies, Transamar, who, since the appeal to the City Council to claim payment for his invoices, has maintained that “the commission of the work was carried out by the then Councillor for Parks and Gardens,” indicating that those in charge of the workshop would contact his company.
Responsibility
The ruling states that the distribution of responsibilities established at the initial meeting in December 2014, when the councilwoman verbally instructed the teachers to contact the suppliers directly, did not absolve her responsibility, but rather served as the mechanism through which she organised the irregular contracting.
Regarding the lack of an execution project, the defence claimed that a detailed technical paper existed. However, the court indicated that this document was geared more towards describing the teaching activity than defining the physical construction, and noted as “especially significant” the existence of a second project prepared in March 2015 on the same subject and with nearly identical plans, implying that it was created retroactively, unexpectedly, to provide legal cover for work already carried out outside of the administrative procedures.
Prevaricating resolution
The defence further claimed that there was no “prevaricating resolution” in technical-legal terms, but rather a recommendation. The court explained that prevarication does not always require a single formal resolution, but can result from a series of actions that constitute a deliberate way of circumventing legal procedures, such as the artificial fragmentation of the project to avoid the obligation to process a complete file, thereby eliminating the control mechanisms that ensure transparency and efficiency in public spending.
The verdict clarifies that the councilwoman’s understanding of the illegality might be inferred from her own reaction to the Local Development Agent’s advice not to pay any additional project-related invoices in March 2015. The councilwoman then briefly suspended the practical actions before initiating an expedited process to contract the works, revealing “her full awareness” that the initial approach lacked legal basis, according to the court.
Mitigating factors
The former councilwoman’s lawyer urged that, if the conviction is sustained, the nine-year period between the initial complaint and the trial be considered a significant element in deciding the disqualification penalty. The court affirmed the basic mitigating circumstance, stating that, despite the duration of the proceedings, it was not “excessive” given the complexity of the case, as indicated by the investigative file’s twenty-one volumes. As a result, the punishment remained at seven years of disqualification.
Absolution
The court, on the other hand, acquitted the workshop director, stating that, while he objectively contributed to the execution of the supplies in accordance with verbal instructions, it has not been proven that his participation was necessary for the commission of the crime or that he acted with full knowledge of contributing to criminal conduct.
The ruling emphasises that the director of the employment workshop, defended by lawyer Fernando Cazorla, was a person outside the City Council hired for six months, who always acted under the guidelines of the person in charge of the project in the City Council, demonstrating his conviction that the orders received were in accordance with the law, and that in response to the warning from the Local Development Agent, he adopted a temporary low profile until receiving mitigating factors
The former councilwoman’s lawyer urged that, if the conviction is sustained, the nine-year period between the initial complaint and the trial be considered a significant element in deciding the disqualification penalty. The court affirmed the basic mitigating circumstance, stating that, despite the duration of the proceedings, it was not “excessive” given the complexity of the case, as indicated by the investigative file’s twenty-one volumes. As a result, the punishment remained at seven years of disqualification.
Absolution
The court, on the other hand, acquitted the workshop director, stating that, while he objectively contributed to the execution of the supplies in accordance with verbal instructions, it has not been proven that his participation was necessary for the commission of the crime or that he acted with full knowledge of contributing to criminal conduct.
The ruling emphasises that the director of the employment workshop, defended by lawyer Fernando Cazorla, was a person outside the City Council hired for six months, who always acted under the guidelines of the person in charge of the project in the City Council, demonstrating his conviction that the orders received were in accordance with the law, and that in response to the warning from the Local Development Agent, he adopted a temporary low profile until receiving new
Author: Derek Appleton
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