Royal in-law doesn’t want court testimony to be videotaped

Royal son-in-law Iñaki Urdangarin does not want anyone to get hold of the video of the oral testimony he is set to give before a Palma de Mallorca judge later this month to answer charges that he allegedly diverted public money through his non-profit institute.

Urdangarin, who has been subpoenaed to appear on February 25, has asked the court not to videotape his testimony as it has done with other defendants and witnesses in the larger Palma de Arena public corruption case. King Juan Carlos’ son-in-law said through his attorney that he feared someone might leak the taped testimony to the media, according to sources.

Mario Pascual Vives, Urdangarin’s lawyer, declined to comment about the petition when asked by EL PAÍS.

The husband of Princess Cristina is accused of receiving some three million euros from the Balearic Islands’ government to organize sports and tourism conferences through his non-profit Nóos Institute. Investigators in the Palma Arena case say they have discovered that much of the money was diverted to Urdangarin’s private companies.

One oddity thrown up by the case is that Urdangarin paid three young people 60 euros a month to do nothing. The reason is not yet clear to investigators, but they are not ruling out it was a way of fattening the expenses of the companies involved in the case.