Judge Pedraz scrutinizes six PSOE accounts and opens a separate economic case for payments to Leire Díez

The judge of the Audiencia Nacional, Santiago Pedraz, has opened a separate economic investigation to look into payments that the PSOE allegedly made to Leire Díez and other members of the alleged plot. The decision traces the money to the center of the 'Leire Díez case', opened due to maneuvers allegedly aimed at obstructing judicial and police procedures affecting the party, the Government, and Pedro Sánchez's inner circle.

The magistrate has requested information from twelve financial entities regarding 81 bank accounts, six of which belong to the PSOE. The request also extends to Gaspar Zarrías and his consultancy Zaño Sociedad Consultores, lawyers Ismael Oliver and Jacobo Teijelo, their respective companies, and the media outlet 'Crónica Libre'.

The banks must provide movements, balances, account holders, authorized persons, national and international transfers, and check operations. The Central Operative Unit of the Civil Guard may request clarifications and additional documentation to reconstruct the complete flow of funds and determine who ordered the payments, which companies were involved, and who ultimately received the money.

Pedraz has supported the diligence, considering that the case investigates the possible commission of "various public crimes related to corruption". The Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office had supported the Civil Guard's request due to the risk that a limited analysis might exclude relevant operations.

The banking documentation will be stored in a separate file due to its sensitive nature. Agents may use it to prepare their report, but must subsequently delete data that is not relevant to the investigation. The judge seeks to prevent the full dump of accounts from leading to a public disclosure of private information unrelated to the procedure.

The UCO traces 43,225 euros to Leire Díez

The Civil Guard has already located five payments totaling 43,225 euros that allegedly reached Leire Díez through companies related to Zarrías and Oliver. Four transfers of 4,000 euros were made between June and September 2024 from Zaño Sociedad Consultores, the company of the historic Andalusian socialist leader.

The investigators maintain that the monthly cost of that contract coincided with the amounts paid by the PSOE to the consultancy. The UCO considers that the payrolls served to channel funds to Díez whose real origin would be in Ferraz. A fifth transfer of 27,225 euros reached the former militant from Oliver Gruppe, a company linked to Ismael Oliver.

The tracing also reaches Jacobo Teijelo. The lawyer issued three invoices to the PSOE for 125,000 euros, not including VAT, which were paid by the party. Anticorruption maintains that he charged for services he did not provide and for which he lacked a contract, while Teijelo has defended before the judge that he was hired to analyze the viability of different judicial procedures.

The Prosecutor's Office also investigates the funds sent to 'Crónica Libre', a media outlet linked to Leire Díez and journalist Patricia López. The PSOE would have sent 18,125 euros to the company through IKI Group Communications during the 2024 European election campaign. Anticorruption adds another payment of 20,000 euros for advertising, managed by the then socialist communication director Ion Antolín at Díez's request.

The judicial hypothesis places Santos Cerdán at the head of the operation. According to the Prosecutor's Office, the former Organization Secretary commissioned Leire Díez in April 2024 to coordinate actions aimed at destabilizing sensitive investigations and made the party's logistical and financial infrastructure available to the group. Cerdán, Díez, Zarrías, Oliver and Teijelo are among those investigated.

Zarrías appeals and the PSOE maintains its previous defense

Gaspar Zarrías has appealed the tracing of the accounts linked to him, considering the diligence "prospective, absurd and unfounded". His defense maintains that only one account received and sent the funds related to Leire Díez and accuses the UCO of trying to "look at everything to see if something is found".

The former socialist leader also protests the period claimed. For the PSOE and most of those investigated, the analysis begins in January 2024, while the accounts related to Zarrías will be examined from January 2022. His appeal denounces that this temporal extension leaves him in a situation of "pure defenselessness".

The PSOE has not yet released an official reaction to the new order. The socialist leadership maintains as its last public defense that in the party "there is no slush fund" and that two additional invoices presented by Teijelo, for a combined amount of 53,000 euros, were rejected and never paid. These invoices are different from the 125,000 euros previously paid to the same lawyer and which the UCO is now analyzing.

The agents must now cross-reference the movements of the six PSOE accounts with the payments received by the companies and those under investigation. The economic report will determine which operations are related to the alleged plot and which part of the banking documentation will finally be incorporated into the 'Leire Díez case'.