Ferraris, Porsches, 17 guns and a United Arab Emirates residency card: The search of Alejandro Betancourt’s mansion in Spain

Alejandro Betancourt’s tentacles in Spain are long. The Venezuelan businessman who amassed a fortune after his country’s power crisis at the end of the 2010s has seen his wealth rise again after the Trump administration touched him with the magic oil wand, entrusting him with crude exploitation in a deal with the government of Venezuela’s interim president, Delcy Rodríguez. The billionaire’s assets in Madrid alone are substantial, according to police documents that are part of an ongoing investigation into alleged money laundering. Authorities seized five luxury cars, a United Arab Emirates residency card and 17 firearms at his private estate in Toledo.

Documents being published by EL PAÍS lay out how a joint operation organized by Switzerland and the police and Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office in Spain carried out a series of judicial searches on August 28 last year that targeted the billionaire, who remains under investigation in Spain for money laundering and tax evasion. Six officers from the Economic and Fiscal Crime Unit (UDEF) attended the Alamín estate, 35 miles from Madrid in Toledo province, carrying an order from High Court Judge Santiago Pedraz. The property, bought by Betancourt in 2012, is valued at over €25 million ($28.7 million) and covers 1,440 hectares. Police say that although the property is registered to the company Inversiones Agrícolas Trieste, it is where the Venezuelan actually lives when he is on Spanish soil.

The tycoon has been under investigation by Spanish authorities since June 2025, when the Anti-Corruption Unit filed a complaint against him, his business partner Pedro Trebbau, and four other individuals for allegedly bringing money into Europe derived “from fraud” totaling $4.35 billion stemming from a loan from the state-owned oil company PDVSA to the private firm Administrador Atlantic. Specifically, the prosecution believes Betancourt laundered part of that money — an amount not yet quantified — through investments in companies and real estate in Spain.

Police searched six addresses in Spain, including the Alamín estate, to trace the funds. At Betancourt’s property they found several luxury cars: two Porsche Cayennes, a third Porsche with Venezuelan plates, a Ferrari F12 Berlinetta without plates and a Mini Cooper Cabrio. Officials consulted the Swiss authorities about whether to seize them and three of the vehicles were flagged as relevant to the investigation.

The Venezuelan vanished, sources in the investigation said, once the UDEF entered the grounds. Agents had tracked him and knew he was at Alamín, but after gaining access they found only his wife and sister. That did not stop the search, which was detailed in a police report. In his mother’s bedroom they found a UAE residency card in the businessman’s name issued December 6, 2023, and valid until December 5, 2025, and in another room they found a cellar with “an indeterminate number of bottles of wine and alcoholic beverages.”

The estate contains a room “set up as an armory” which, according to the police account, was “locked,” but later opened by a man of about 42 who said he was “responsible for keeping the key” to the room. He said he did not know what was inside and, once police opened it, they found 17 weapons (13 rifles and four shotguns) “without the corresponding documentation” and registered in the name of a third party, M. E. G. R. They also found three firearm silencers and assorted ammunition. The only cash discovered amounted to $8,600.

Betancourt’s networks in Spain extend to some well-known figures in the conservative opposition Popular Party and to the publisher of a mainstream outlet, according to sources close to the probe. The estate is not his only lavish property. On the Madrid–Toledo border the Casa de Yeguas of Alamín was also searched, where the UDEF found only “tools,” “agricultural equipment,” “derelict buildings and stables,” “old furniture” and “remnants of agricultural products.” They also found 60 cows and two fighting bulls.

Through his companies, the Venezuelan owns two other flats in the capital — one facing the Puerta de Alcalá and another on Paseo de la Castellana, both in well-heeled downtown neighborhoods. Officers likewise found nothing of note there. In one flat, inside the master bedroom’s dressing room, they examined two safes built into the wall — one behind a mirror and the other “revealed after removing a piece of furniture.” The Police Technical Intervention Group (GOIT), which specializes in this type of search, found nothing beyond an empty Cartier envelope.

Part of the seized material was sent to the Swiss investigators, while little progress has been made on the Spanish case since then. Judge Pedraz attempted to dismiss the case on one occasion after Betancourt submitted a document in which Venezuela exonerated him of the alleged corruption offenses involving PDVSA. If the money does not have an illicit source (in this case, embezzlement from the oil company, the proceeds of which were used to enrich the defendants), it could not be proven that the investments in Europe were made to launder this money. The Criminal Chamber of the National Court ordered the judge to reopen the case and wait for the United States to provide the testimony of five key witnesses. These are five individuals who have already been convicted there in connection with the scheme known as “Money Flight,” which acknowledges that payments were made to PDVSA officials to enable money to be siphoned off from the oil company through a disguised operation.

The Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office maintains that if those witnesses testify in the Spanish case the predicate offense would be established and investigators could deepen the probe into Betancourt and his circle’s alleged money laundering activities. Betancourt rejects any corruption accusation and has submitted Venezuelan documentation seeking exoneration. Washington, which has made Betancourt its point of contact with Delcy Rodríguez’s government, has for months not replied to the Spanish High Court’s request for judicial cooperation, which is not only stalling the investigation but has put it on a timetable. Judge Pedraz has said that if he does not have a response by December, he will have no choice but to close the investigation into the billionaire.

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