{"id":7667,"date":"2026-06-19T18:58:27","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T15:58:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/?p=7667"},"modified":"2026-06-19T18:22:15","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T15:22:15","slug":"spanish-judge-probes-eu-funds-fraud-by-pms-wife","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/spanish-judge-probes-eu-funds-fraud-by-pms-wife\/","title":{"rendered":"Spanish Judge Probes EU Funds Fraud by PM’s Wife"},"content":{"rendered":"

Magistrate Juan Carlos Peinado<\/strong> has separated a new line of investigation from the existing case against G\u00f3mez to examine public contracts financed with EU money. He has requested prosecutors assess whether the conduct under scrutiny constitutes criminal activity.<\/p>\n

The investigation centers on contracts awarded by Red.es, a state-owned entity, to companies connected to businessman Juan Carlos Barrab\u00e9s<\/strong>. Authorities aim to determine whether irregularities occurred in the awarding process.<\/p>\n

This portion of the case had previously been handled by the European Public Prosecutor’s Office, which spent nearly two years investigating whether Barrab\u00e9s received preferential treatment in securing publicly funded contracts. Spain’s Audiencia Nacional, a high-level court, ruled in favor of an appeal that stripped the European prosecutor’s office of jurisdiction and returned the matter to Peinado’s court.<\/p>\n

G\u00f3mez faces accusations of writing letters of recommendation for firms that subsequently competed for and secured government-funded contracts. She has consistently denied any wrongdoing.<\/p>\n

The Spanish Government, based at Moncloa Palace, quickly rejected the latest development as baseless, with sources asserting G\u00f3mez had no involvement with the contract under investigation.<\/p>\n

This new inquiry proceeds independently from the primary case, in which G\u00f3mez, Barrab\u00e9s, and presidential adviser Cristina \u00c1lvarez<\/strong> are being investigated for four alleged offenses. Peinado has concluded that phase and recommended the three face trial by jury.<\/p>\n

G\u00f3mez and \u00c1lvarez currently await a judicial decision on precautionary measures requested by a private prosecution, which seeks passport confiscation, a travel ban preventing them from leaving Spain, and mandatory fortnightly court appearances.<\/p>\n

The investigation into G\u00f3mez originated from a complaint filed by a right-wing advocacy organization. It has evolved into a persistent source of political tension between S\u00e1nchez’s minority left-wing government and opposition forces who have repeatedly called for his resignation.<\/p>\n

With information from Brussels Signal<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Spanish judge has opened a new criminal investigation into Prime Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez’s wife Bego\u00f1a G\u00f3mez for alleged fraud involving EU funds and abuse of public office.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39,"featured_media":7666,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[122],"tags":[7570,7571,7574,7572,921,7573,630],"nfg_topic":[134],"class_list":["post-7667","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-begona-gomez","tag-eu-funds-fraud","tag-juan-carlos-barrabes","tag-juan-carlos-peinado","tag-pedro-sanchez","tag-red-es","tag-spain","nfg_topic-europe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/39"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7667"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7667\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7837,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7667\/revisions\/7837"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7666"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7667"},{"taxonomy":"nfg_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsfire.gr\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/nfg_topic?post=7667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}