MADRID // Spain’s Princess Cristina was found not guilty in a tax fraud case on Friday, while her husband was convicted and sentenced to more than six years in prison.
A panel of judges ordered Princess Cristina, the sister of King Felipe VI, to pay nearly €265,000 (Dh1.04 million) in fines because she indirectly benefited from the fraud.
Her husband, Inaki Urdangarin, was found guilty of evading taxes, fraud and various other charges. He was sentenced to six years and three months in prison in a decision that can be appealed to the supreme court.
The trial centered on accusations that Urdangarin used his former title, Duke of Palma, to embezzle about €6m in public funds for the nonprofit Noos Institute.
The institute organised conferences and sports-related events and was run with a partner, Diego Torres, who was sentenced to eight and a half years in jail in Friday’s ruling by a provincial court in Palma de Mallorca, in the Balearic Islands.
Among the companies they used was Aizoon, a real estate consulting company jointly owned by Princess Cristina and Urdangarin.
A lawyer with the princess’s defence team, Miquel Roca, said she was “satisfied for the acknowledgement of her innocence” but that she was still convinced that her husband was not guilty.
“If we believed in the judicial system when the princess was made to sit in the dock, I think citizens can trust in it when she’s absolved,” Mr Roca said.
A spokesman for the royal household told Spanish media that the royal family respected the court’s decision.
There was no immediate comment from King Felipe and Queen Letizia, who received news of the ruling during a visit to a museum in Madrid with the Hungarian president.
* Associated Press