A judicial error, denounced by the defense lawyers, has released the alleged perpetrators of an international plot that in summer of 2022 more than nine million euros in Adeje (south of Tenerife) through the fraudulent sale of real estate and the emptying of bank accounts of Russian citizens using false notarial powers. The decision, adopted by Arona Court of Instruction number 4, has meant the archive of the case despite the abundant indications documented during police investigation. This resolution has been appealed in Reforma and is pending the prosecutor’s report for resolution.
The network, according to the proceedings, operated through Russia that allowed to sell luxury properties without the consent of its owners and access their bank accounts. In total, 11 properties changed hands using this method. The defense lawyer, Mauro Jordán, has assured El País that the judge has issued a self -dismissal car “without examining a single indication of crime” based solely on the prosecutor’s argument, which only exempt the Spanish notary. In Tenerife currently reside 3,665 Russian citizens, according to the latest data from the National Statistics Institute. This population is mostly concentrated in the tourist south of the island (Adeje and Arona), where some 2,200 people of this nationality live.
The plot, according to the judicial attestation, used false notarial powers in the name of the victims that were issued in Russia. The person in charge of receiving them in Spain was Timofey Shilov, who appears as a selling part (without the consent of the victims) in all transmissions. The buying part was always a non -existent society, Ramos Royalty, represented by another of the accused, Ángel Gastón Ramos. This company is currently the registration of the 11 properties. The network also pretended the existence of a Russian subsidiary of this company to simulate the reception of funds from the country.
Finally, a collaborator, Olesya Rishko, tried, on the other hand, to empty bank accounts of victims with false documentation. To justify the origin of money, the organization invented an international loan of 50 million euros from a Russian company, Nita Farm, which has categorically denied any link with those investigated.
Police investigation has documented a framework based on falsification of Russian notaries, manipulation of apostillas and use of fraudulent digital documentation. The Russian notary certified that it never issued the attributed powers; The Russian commercial registry confirmed that Ramos Royalty LLC does not exist; and the Bank Alliance Republican Credit denied the opening of the accounts that the suspects alleged as the origin of the money.
The case jumped into the media in October 2022, after the complaint of the administrator and president of a community of owners in Playa Fañabé, in Adeje. This person assured that in the urbanization, eight of the 40 chalets had been will be busy by new tenants who claimed to be the owners. The complainant said that, despite the writings that a real estate group had filed, these properties had not been sold for their owners, all Russians. According to the new owner, he approached the urbanization with an alarm company to change the locks and access four of the eight homes that he would have allegedly acquired for 460,000 euros each, when the market value of those attached exceeds 720,000 euros. The administrator assured Notices diary That the papers “present with the signature of the notary, the sale seems legal.” “But we have denounced it, because Russian owners insist that they have not sold anything or intend to do it.”
In addition to these arrests, Arona’s Court of Instruction number 1 ordered records in homes and offices of those involved, during which false contracts, manipulated apostillas and apocryphal notarial powers were intervened. He also blocked accounts, withdrew passports and prohibited from having the properties.
The victims also requested the imputation of the Spanish notary, Roberto Jesús Cutillas, considering that notary should have detected certain formal irregularities in the powers that were presented to him. The court, however, rejected it in a providence issued in November 2022. The defense, however, filed an appeal. While resolving, Court number 1 was inhibited in favor of number 4, which became responsible for deciding on this request. On January 30, 2024, the new court admitted it to process. A year later, on January 13, he dismissed him.
In addition, that same day, Judge Manuel Muñiz agreed to dismiss the entire cause, which has meant that the main suspects are released. To do this, he literally copied an argument of the Fiscal Ministry of 2022, which only referred not to impute the notary, according to lawyer Mauro Jordán de la Peña.
The lawyer argues that the magistrate confused the secondary issue of the notary’s responsibility with the main purpose of the procedure, which was to determine the existence of the real estate scam. Jordan has assured El País that the judge has issued a self -dismissal car “without examining a single indication of crime of the multiple there, being an almost rude error and being wrong when copying and pasteing a report from the Fiscal Ministry that had nothing to do with the archive of the case.” The magistrate has refused to give his opinion of the facts.
