MADRID (AP) – Spanish prosecutors are shelving two investigations into alleged financial wrongdoing in Juan Carlos I’s business dealings that prompted the former monarch to move from Spain to Abu Dhabi.
Prosecutors in the Spanish Supreme Court said on Wednesday they didn’t find evidence that could be prosecuted, because the monarch was protected by immunity until his abdication eight years ago and because any possible fraud fell out of the statute of limitations.
The probes allowed the recovery of EUR5.1 million in fines and taxes for income that Juan Carlos had failed to declare to Spain’s tax authorities, the prosecutors said in their conclusions.
One of the probes involved offshore accounts in Jersey, a tax haven, that prosecutors said couldn’t currently be linked to the 84-year-old Juan Carlos.
The other one centred around a EUR65-million payment that was suspected to be a commission for the former monarch’s mediation in a high-speed railway contract between the Saudi Arabian cities of Madinah
and Makkah.
Prosecutors said they couldn’t find a link between the “gift” given to Juan Carlos and the project, which was executed by a Spanish consortium.
A Swiss probe on money laundering involving some of the funds was also dropped last year, although Geneva prosecutors fined a Swiss bank for failing to alert authorities on Juan Carlos’ transactions.
In a statement, the former king’s lawyer said that prosecutors had cleared the former king from “any illicit conduct susceptible to criminal reproach”.
Juan Carlos, who retains the title of “King Emerit”, moved to the United Arab Emirates in mid-2020 after the judicial probes on his possible financial wrongdoings emerged.
