Spanish dictator Franco’s grandson charged with ramming police car during high-speed chase

A DICTATOR’S grandson has been jailed for ramming a police car during a Hollywood-style car chase.

Francisco Franco Martinez-Bordiu, 63, was sentenced to 30 months in prison after a judge in Teruel, Aragon, described his testimony as “not very credible and totally out of touch with reality.”

He is the grandson of former Spanish leader General Francisco Franco, the fascist military dictator who ruled the country from 1939 to 1975.

And he must now serve 18 months behind bars for aggravated assault plus a further 12 months for dangerous driving, the court said in a statement.

Former employee Silviu Nicolae, a Romanian who he blamed for the incident, has been acquitted of all charges.

The ruling comes after Martinez-Bordiu was spotted driving at night without any lights on.

But when a Guardia Civil traffic patrol indicated that he should pull over, the high-ranking noble put his foot down and attempted to flee, passing several mandatory stop signs before careering into the side of a police car and running it off the road.

During the trial, the aristocrat maintained that he was not driving the vehicle and that he had been in Madrid at the time, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary including the testimony of a police officer who identified him at the scene.

He even provided witnesses supporting his claim that he had travelled to the Spanish capital when bad weather set in, stopping him from hunting on his estate in Aranda del Moncayo, Zaragoza.

It is not the first time that he has been in trouble with the law, having been charged with attacking a railway employee after missing a train in 2009, only for the alleged victim to fail to attend the trial.

Martinez-Bordiu’s mother and Franco’s only child, Maria del Carmen Franco Polo, died in December.