Malaya hearing closes after 22 months

By Rund Abdelfatah

The hearing for the largest town hall corruption case to ever hit Spain has ended after 22 months and 199 sessions, with verdicts to be delivered in the next eight months.

The Malaya case investigated barefaced corruption in Marbella Town Hall between 2002 and 2006.

An alleged €33 million was paid in backhanders to town hall officials in exchange for property licences to build on non-urban land.

The trial began on September 27, 2010, with the tribunal president promising ‘absolute independence and impartiality’.

The case originally had 95 suspects but since the start nine people have been cleared of the charges against them.

Juan Antonio Roca, town hall property boss throughout the ‘corruption’ and the man allegedly at the centre of all the dirty dealings, faces 30 years in prison.

Granada property promoter Jose Avila Rojas – also a suspect – says the Malaya case was the start of the crisis in Spain, and that it damaged the most dynamic profession that existed.