Spanish prosecutors have requested eight years in prison for Juan Bernardo Fuentes Curbelo, known as Tito Berni, in the Mediador corruption case in the Canary Islands. The term comprises six years for continuous bribery and two years for membership in a criminal group. Prosecutors allege that people in public office solicited payments and gifts from business owners in return for promises involving public contracts and subsidies, as well as administrative influence. The request reflects the prosecution’s position, not a conviction; the court must determine guilt at trial.
The prosecution is also seeking 13 years in prison for Estructura Antonio Navarro Tacoronte, whom investigators have described as a basic intermediary in the alleged network. The requested term includes six years for bribery and two for membership in a criminal group. It also includes three years for ongoing fraud, one for document falsification and one for influence peddling. Taishet Fuentes Gutiérrez, the former Canary Islands director general of Livestock, faces a requested 11-year sentence on charges including bribery, membership in a criminal group and fraud. These allegations concern distinct roles in the prosecution’s account of the case.
Information from the case file, the alleged scheme operated for about nine months, from late September 2020 to July 2021. Prosecutors say the three basic defendants sought to attract entrepreneurs with business opportunities and access to public contracts in exchange for illicit payments. The indictment alleges that they used official positions and confidential information to help those arrangements. Several companies are said to have transferred around €100,000 to accounts linked to Navarro Tacoronte, as well as making donations to a sports club presided over by Fuentes Curbelo. Reporting by El Progreso has also described an allegation that Fuentes Curbelo directly requested money from an entrepreneur.
Fuentes Curbelo was a sitting PSOE deputy when the allegations became public and was later removed from the party’s parliamentary group. The investigation also raised questions about materials held in his former Congress of Deputies office. El Nacional reported that a judge sought the delivery of items from the office and that Congress ordered his belongings handed to police. Prosecutors reportedly opposed a search of the chamber itself, arguing that it was “inviolable,” while accepting the delivery of electronic devices. The dispute highlighted institutional limits on searches of parliamentary premises.
The case has drawn attention to alleged links between political access and business interests in the Canary Islands. Prosecutors say promised administrative favors were not delivered despite payments, sharpening scrutiny of oversight and safeguards against the sale of purported access to public decision-making. The case also comes amid continued public attention to government spending and integrity, including debate over the financial impact of social policies such as the state's growing burden from unemployment subsidies for older workers.
The Canary Islands have seen several high-profile corruption investigations in recent years. The Mediador case stands out for the alleged involvement of former senior officials and the relatively short period in which prosecutors say the scheme operated. The prosecution’s charges and sentence requests remain to be tested in court; they are not a final judgment. Spain’s Consejo General del Poder Judicial distinguishes procedural milestones, such as an order opening an oral trial, from a court’s final ruling.
