How José Manuel Villarejo’s deep-status apparatus shook the establishment

October 12th, 2021. Published by POLITICO.

MADRID — For the past half-decade, José Manuel Villarejo has been the most mysterious and vilified person in Spain. Now he is due to have his day in court.

The 70-year-old former policeman is widely believed to have been at the center of a deep-state apparatus stretching back decades whose tentacles reached into the media, judiciary, big business and politics. His activities are believed to have tarnished the reputations of an array of ministers, business leaders, senior figures in the judiciary, and even the monarchy.

Prosecutors have probed 30 separate lines of investigation related to his activities and he is accused of a barrage of crimes ranging from bribery and extortion to forgery and influence peddling. The court will try him over the next few months for a handful of the cases in which he has been implicated, along with 32 other defendants. If found guilty, he could face a prison term of over 50 years.

Villarejo has barely spoken to the media in recent years, fuelling his enigmatic persona. And while many expect the upcoming trial to reveal not the truth about his career, he has warned it will also expose how the Spanish state has been complicit in his activities.

“I am convinced that those who see me as a lamb who will quietly go to the slaughter are mistaken,” Villarejo told POLITICO in one written answer to questions given to him via his lawyer. (See article)