Roca freed over Malaya, but remains in prison for Saqueo
The Málaga Provincial Court has ordered the provisional release of the most important player in Marbella’s Malaya corruption scandal, Juan Antonio Roca. His release was granted on March 23 because he has served his maximum sentence in the Malaya case.
However, Roca, a former Marbella real estate assessor, will not leave jail just yet. He will continue serving time for “Saqueo I,” in which he was convicted for diverting municipal funds into his private accounts. He was sentenced to a concurrent six years and ten months for his involvement in Saqueo and will be eligible for release in summer 2011.
Roca was intially imprisoned in March 2006 for his involvement in the Malaya corruption scandal, which rose all the way to some of Marbella’s most important and famous people. It also involved two former mayors, Julián Muñoz and Marisol Yagüe, and Spanish singer Isabel Pantoja, a companion of Muñoz, who served one night in jail as a suspect in 2007.
As investigations into ‘Operation Malaya’ unfolded, the scandal eventually involved a total of 99 defendants who together embezzled more than 500 million euros from Marbella city coffers. Although many defendants have already served their sentences, the total effect of the scandal has never been determined.
No one has calculated, for example, how much Roca stole. It is believed that he has distributed many of the embezzled funds in accounts around the globe.
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