Former Castellon president Carlos Fabra scrapes up cash to pay fine

EX-POLITICIAN Carlos Fabra is selling his Oropesa (Castellon) villa to pay a €750,000 fine.

Fabra, former president of the Castellon Provincial Council and the provincial Partido Popular, is currently in prison.  He is serving a four-year sentence for tax fraud between 1999 and 2003 and must also repay €700,000.

Seventy-year-old Fabra has already settled half of the sum by selling another of his properties, a Madrid apartment.  Now he must find the remainder and is looking for a buyer for the Oropesa house.

The former politician emerged unscathed from a series of prosecutions over an 11-year period, for offences that ranged from influence-peddling to bribery but finally entered prison for tax fraud in December 2014.

Fabra is renowned for spending €150 million on Castellon airport which was inaugurated in 2011 complete with a 20-ton sculpture, supposedly a homage to Fabra, that cost €427,000 but without an aircraft in sight. 

No scheduled flights arrived there until four years later after the airport was acquired by the Canadian company ANC Lavalin.