Former regional jobs commissioner sent to jail in lay-off fund scam inquiry

Andalusia’s former employment commissioner Antonio Fernández was taken into custody without bail early Tuesday for his alleged role in a fraud scheme involving a public fund set up to help companies pay severance packages to laid-off workers.

Judge Mercedes Alaya, who is investigating the case, is also looking at the possible indictment of other former officials who served in the Socialist government during the time the fraud occurred.

Fernández is the highest-ranking politician to be indicted in the case so far. He faces charges of bribery, falsifying documents, embezzlement, dereliction of his public duties, and carrying out negotiations that are prohibited for a government official.

Judge Alaya gave the defendant her 77-page ruling after hearing arguments from anti-corruption prosecutors, who requested that he be held in custody until his trial.

The Popular Party (PP) in Andalusia and the far-right union Manos Limpias, have also filed criminal complaints against Fernández.

In her ruling, Alaya said that Fernández was a flight risk and could hamper the ongoing investigation if he remained free. She ordered him not to make any contact with Javier Guerrero — the former director general of the regional labor department who has been in preventive custody since March 10 — during his stay in jail.

If convicted, Fernández could face a prison term of up to 18 years for embezzlement.

Fernández testified for three days, beginning Friday, before Alaya made her decision.

The fund, set up to help struggling companies, illegally paid out 647 million euros in job benefits to people who didn’t qualify, the judge said. Alaya also accused Fernández of being the mastermind behind the fund, saying he sought ways to keep auditors from the Andalusian government and European Union from reviewing the region’s finances.