Arantxa Sanchez Vicario sentenced to two years in prison for concealing assets | People

Arantxa Sánchez Vicario has more or less successfully emerged from the lawsuit she faced last September for concealing assets to avoid paying off a million-dollar debt to the Bank of Luxembourg. This Wednesday, January 17, the Criminal Court No. 25 of Barcelona sentenced the former tennis player, who admitted the facts, to two years in prison for the crime of embezzlement. pending. At the trial, the Roland Garros champion blamed her ex-husband Josep Santacana, with whom she also has a long-standing dispute in the United States, for the operation. The judge concludes that the businessman, who maintained his innocence to the end, led the maneuvers to avoid paying the debt. His sentence for the same crime is higher: three years and three months in prison. Both must reimburse the banking institution for a payment of 6.6 million euros, which corresponds to the outstanding debt plus interest.

The verdict is not final and can be appealed; Given that the penalties are not too high, it is unlikely that prosecutors will consider jailing Santacana before making a final decision. The ruling effectively suspends the execution of Arantxa Sánchez Vicario’s (but not Santacana’s) sentence for two years, meaning she won’t have to go to jail with the condition that she not commit another crime in the next two years. In addition to the ex-couple, three more people were sentenced (to one year and three months in prison), who acted as dummies in the operation to get rid of the capital.

The ruling considers it “fully proven” that the former tennis player “has and has always had sufficient assets to cover the debt” claimed by the Bank of Luxembourg. However, the then-couple held “sale promotions” of the player’s real estate in order to avoid paying. The judge gives her a lighter sentence because “she accepted responsibility for the facts.” The reduction of the sentence is based on two mitigating circumstances: confession and compensation for damages, since throughout the criminal process he provided the court with his income to pay off the debt.

“Complete knowledge” of the former tennis player

At the trial, Arantxa admitted her guilt, but blamed her husband and assured that it was he who convinced her not to pay the Bank of Luxembourg. In this sense, the judge fully trusts her version. Beginning in 2009, a year after his marriage, the businessman “managed his wife’s assets” and was the person who “developed and carried out deactivation operations.” According to the court, it is “absolutely plausible” that Arantxa “had neither knowledge of asset management, nor probably any interest, and that he always delegated the management of his assets to third parties.” Remember, for example, that Santakana worked in real estate, so he had “knowledge” in this matter. But she cannot be acquitted because she not only admitted the facts, but also “fully knew what was being done with her assets and enjoyed it.”

Prosecutors initially asked for a four-year prison sentence for the crime of confiscating the assets of Sanchez Vicario and Santacana, in a court case that is closely tied to the former tennis player’s problems with the Treasury. In 2009, the Supreme Court fined her $5.2 million for tax fraud. The tax agency was able to obtain this amount thanks to a guarantee from the Bank of Sabadell, which in turn returned the money through a counter-guarantee signed with the Bank of Luxembourg, to which a significant part of the wealth accumulated during his sports career was transferred. have been deposited. This latter organization repeatedly demanded money from the player, but the assets apparently disappeared. Then he decided to go to court.

The prosecutor’s thesis (with which Arantxa agrees) is that the couple disposed of assets (especially real estate) to avoid paying off debt. At that time, the player owned about fifteen properties, including luxury houses in Barcelona, ​​on the Costa Brava and in the Catalan Pyrenees. Under the “slogans” of Santakana and through dummies, the couple sold this property and transferred the profits to companies in the United States managed by the businessman.

Two years before the trial, when the investigation of the case was already completed, the three-time Roland Garros champion radically changed her defense strategy. In order to obtain a reduced sentence, he accepted his share of the blame: he admitted that he had hidden assets, but stated that he did so on the clear and precise instructions of his former partner, whose agent he represented himself. “victim.” This was the beginning of a strategy that culminated in the trial when he attacked Santakana head-on: “I wanted to pay, but he told me no. It would be better for us to have money than to pay the bank. I trusted him. I regret”.

Their strategy was to obtain a commutation of the sentence, as it did, through repentance and restitution. Arantxa assured in an interview with this newspaper that he makes a living by giving private tennis lessons in Miami (USA), where he lives with two children, and that half of everything he earns goes into the treasury of the Bank of Luxembourg. . Since the beginning of the criminal process, she has transferred 1.9 million and is ready to repay the entire debt. This approach has already yielded good results in court: at the last hearing, prosecutors reduced the player’s request for a prison sentence to two years, while maintaining Santacana’s request for four years. The businessman, for his part, firmly maintained his innocence and brought charges against the former tennis player and her family. According to her version, she still has money, companies and real estate hidden.