King's son-in-law to face four charges in Nóos case

Iñaki Urdangarin will be tried for the crimes of embezzlement, corruption, influence peddling and falsification of documents over his management of the non-profit Nóos Institute, sources close to the judicial investigation confirmed on the basis of evidence gathered over the last nine months.

Urdangarin, the Duke of Palma, stands accused of siphoning millions of euros from the Nóos Institute for organizing sports and tourism conferences in the Balearic Islands. As part of the investigation into the royal son-in-law's business activities, 63 company owners and administrators were questioned by police over invoices issued to the Nóos Institute for work that was never carried out.

One of Urdangarin's private companies, Aizoon, was the recipient of some of the money funneled out of funds paid to Nóos for conferences and events.

An additional charge of tax evasion for the non-declaration of 375,000 euros in a Swiss bank account has been dropped as the amount supposedly defrauded did not exceed the 120,000-euro minimum laid out in the Penal Code. During the judicial investigation, Urdangarin has sought to lay the blame for Nóos' financial anomalies on his erstwhile business partner Diego Torres, but apparently to no avail.

The judge presiding over the case said that there is ample documentary and witness evidence that suggests quite the opposite is true. Urdangarin, who oversaw Nóos from 2002 to 2006, was ordered by King Juan Carlos in 2007 to cease his business activities when the whiff of an investigation was first detected. The king's daughter, Princess Cristina, will not be investigated.