Spain: Prosecutors shelve fraud probes haunting former king

Spanish prosecutors are shelving two investigations into alleged financial wrongdoing in Juan Carlos I’s business dealings that prompted the former monarch to move from Spain to Abu Dhabi

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Spanish prosecutors are shelving two investigations into alleged financial wrongdoing in Juan Carlos I's business dealings that prompted the former monarch to move from Spain to Abu Dhabi.

Prosecutors in the Spanish Supreme Court said Wednesday they didn't find evidence that could be prosecuted, because the monarch was protected by immunity until his abdication eight years ago and because any possible fraud fell out of the statute of limitations.

The probes allowed the recovery of 5.1 million euros ($5.6 million) in fines and taxes for income that Juan Carlos had failed to declare to Spain's tax authorities, the prosecutors said in their conclusions.

The former monarch, 84, moved to the United Arab Emirates in mid-2020 after the judicial probes on his possible financial wrongdoings emerged. A Swiss probe on money laundering was also dropped recently.

Spanish media have reported Juan Carlos' interest in returning home, but the issue is highly divisive in Spain: some say the former king's role in steering the country from dictatorship to democracy in the late 1970s and early 1980s trumps his sins, while a growing number have used the probes to demand more accountability for members of the royal family — or even to open a debate on the future of Spain's monarchy.

Juan Carlos abdicated in favor of his son Felipe VI in 2014 following a series of scandals in the royal family. Since becoming king, Felipe has tried to distance himself from his father and rebuild the Spanish crown's image.