2,000 people working without a contract last year, and nearly 500 of them were also collecting unemployment pay.

Work inspectors in the province of Málaga found some 2,000 people working without a contract last year, and nearly 500 of them were also collecting unemployment pay.
Shops and the hostelry business were most controlled by the inspectors in the province last year, and their work recovered 12 million € additional income for Social Security.The numbers are four times higher than those seen in 2008 as the number of work inspections is stepped up.

900 foreign criminals were expelled from the country last year

Spanish Ministry of the Interior has announced plans to reduce the number of foreign prisoners being held in Spanish jails. They want to try to get prisoners to serve their time in the jails of their country of origin.In Spain there are 27,091 foreigner prisoners from 110 countries currently, 242% more than in 2000. The numbers include Cataluña where responsibility for prisons has been devolved to the region.A statement from the Ministry for the Interior said that ‘foreigners are not to blame for the overcrowding in Spanish jails’ noting that the number of foreign prisoners only increased by 3% last year, but even so Spain has one of the highest percentages of foreign prisoners in Europe at 35%.The law already allows for a foreign prisoner to apply to be transferred to his or her home country if he or she wishes, and last year 580 made the application of which 249 have been repatriated. However many do not make the application as conditions in Spanish jails are generally good.If the prison sentence is less than six years and the criminal has not legal residence in Spain he can be extradited instead of going to prison, and under that rule more than 900 foreign criminals were expelled from the country last year.

Socialist Mayor of Cártama, José Garrido, has been indicted on charges of perversion of the course of justice.

Socialist Mayor of Cártama, José Garrido, has been indicted on charges of perversion of the course of justice. He is accused by the Prosecutors’ Office of having deliberately let an order expire against a local resident who had built a home on non-buildable land.The case is being investigated by Instruction Court 5 in Málaga and refers to December 2005 when the Town Hall inspectors noted the house being built on rustic land. There was an initial fine and the site was taped up, but the citizen continued to build despite several visits from municipal technicians in January, March, April and May 2006. Work was still continuing in February 2007, and in October 2008 , SEPRONA, the Environmental Division of the Guardia Civil asked the Ayuntamiento for details of the sanction imposed. That sanction expired in December of that year, and now the Mayor faces charges.The Mayor contends that competences in the case are unclear, and said he has done nothing wrong as no irregular licence was issued by the council. He also noted the lack of resources to carry out any demolitions saying that there are more than 2,000 similar cases currently outstanding. The house concerned in the case currently remains standing.

Date for the start of the court cases for the ‘Malaya’ corruption scandal and the ‘Ballena Blanca’ money laundering affair could coincide

Date for the start of the court cases for the ‘Malaya’ corruption scandal and the ‘Ballena Blanca’ money laundering affair could coincide and that it causing differences between the Málaga Provincial Court and the Anti Corruption Prosecutor’s Office. Final start dates for both cases are still to be set, but they could coincide according to the President of the Provincial Court, Francisco Javier Arroyo. That would cause serious problems for the prosecutor, Juan Carlos López Caballero, who has instructed both cases, and the Chief Prosecutor, Antonio Morales, has concluded that ‘in common sense both cases cannot coincide’.Ballena Blanca was set to start at the end of March, while Malaya could start at the end of May, but with the first expected to last six months and the second a year an overlap is likely. Ballena Blanca has to deal with 19 accused and some 80,000 sheets of evidence, while Malaya has 103 accused and the court summary is 90,000 sheets long.
Antonio Morales considers that the Malaya case should wait until after Ballena Blanca has been completed and has told Diario Sur that he does not understand the hurry.To add to the problems there is a third case, ‘Minutas’ which already has a fixed date of April 6 to June 4 where here the prosecutor, Francisco Jiménez Villarejo, also belongs to the same anti-corruption department.

Two Latin American boys aged 14 and 16 have been charged with the murder of the 71 year old British pensioner Peter Cockshutt

Two Latin American boys aged 14 and 16 have been charged with the murder of the 71 year old British pensioner Peter Cockshutt who was found dead in his home in Arona on the Costa del Silencio, on Tenerife, after what is thought to have been a burglary gone wrong. One of the boys was arrested on Tuesday afternoon, the other on
Tuesday night.The British man, who comes from Brandesburton, near Beverley in East Yorkshire was stabbed twice in the chest and once in the leg. His body was found by a friend on Monday.The two boys are also accused or robbery and both will appear before the judge shortly, and are being held in Guardia Civil custody. An autopsy has been carried out on the victim, but the results have not yet been made public.
It’s understood the two boys have confessed to the crime, and reporting restrictions have been introduced in the case.

Torrevieja Brits are the largest group, making up 16 percent of the total number of operations being carried out

Brits are the largest group, making up 16 percent of the total number of operations being carried outForeign patients now make up 42% of the activity in the operating theatres at the District Hospital in Torrevieja. The largest group is the British, who made up 16% of the 22,640 operations carried out in the hospital in 2009. It shows the high numbers of British tourists in the area, and the number who live in the town for at least part of the year, many of them aged over 65. Britons make up 10% of the padron census in the 12 municipalities serviced by the hospital.
Next group, but with no more than 5% of the total, come the Germans, then the Norwegians and Moroccans.The numbers come amid increasing concerns in the Spanish press about the costs of providing care to ‘health tourists’, and claims that Spain is not getting all the costs of such operations reimbursed in full.

price of resale property in Spain increased in January

price of resale property in Spain increased in January for the first time in 24 months, according to the real estate portal fotocasa.es. Prices rose by 0.6% on average, with the regions of Cataluña, and La Rioja seeing the greatest recovery in price at 4.6% and 4.5%. Prices also rose in the regions of Comunidad Valenciana (2,2%), Asturias (2%), Baleares (1,9%), Aragón (1,4%), Galicia (0,9%) and Madrid (0,7%).It takes the average price of per square metre for resale property to 2,366 €.

Baltasar Garzón, is to appeal against the Supreme Court case which accused him of adopting resolutions

Baltasar Garzón, is to appeal against the Supreme Court case which accused him of adopting resolutions which were allegedly a perversion of the course of justice, by starting to investigate the disappearances of people during the Franco years in Spain.Garzón has said that the Supreme Court case is ‘unsustainable and incomprehensible’ and he has accused the Judge Luciano Varela of using ‘depreciatory arguments’ with no legal base. Garzón has called for international experts who have judged similar crimes to be brought in. Garzón says that Varela has ‘a preconceived idea which stops him analysing the facts objectively’.Garzón also faces a second case where he is accused of not declaring additional income obtained allegedly from the Banco Santander when he was on a sabbatical year in New York.
Meanwhile the Prosecutors Office has said it does not support the accusations being made against the judge and they will be sending their considerations to the CGPJ, despite the fact that the General Council for Judicial Power, the body which oversees the judiciary, started the procedures on Tuesday to suspend the judge.
The Attorney General, Cándido Conde-Pumpido, has said that, in principle, he can see no criminal behaviour which will allow the accusations being made against the judge to be justified.The group ‘Judges for Democracy’ has also expressed its ‘deepest concern’ about the decision of Varela to proceed against Garzón who they do not consider at fault.

woman was reported missing last November, and her chopped up body was found on waste land in Campos, Mallorca

Five Ecuadorians have been arrested on Mallorca in connection with the discovery of the body of a 35 year old Bolivian woman.The woman was reported missing last November, and her chopped up body was found on waste land in Campos, Mallorca, the day after the first three people were arrested this week. Paul Gregory R.C., aged 41; Norma del Rocio V.S., aged 39, and Luis Rodrigo Q.Q. who is said to have been the main author of the killing and who is aged 43. Two further arrests were made on Wednesday and further detentions have not been ruled out in the case.