Bárbara Rey and her order to the Treasury: the 'vedette' risks ending up in prison after 12 years of fighting

The life of Bárbara Rey has been crumbling in prime time for decades, but when everything seemed counted, the Provincial Prosecutor's Office of Madrid entered the scene this Friday. The last chapter comes in the form of an indictment, with five pages detailing how the star has tried to avoid her debts with the Tax Agency through alleged fraudulent operations since 2011. The Prosecutor's Office maintains that Bárbara Rey caused an “insolvency situation” to avoid payments and asks for three and a half years in prison.

Along with María García García, which is what the actress is called, six other people will sit in the dock: her children Sofía and Ángel Cristo, her sister Petra, her nephew Fernando Santos, her friend Mishell Jannin Hurtado and the businesswoman Monica Lozano. The Prosecutor's Office asks for two and a half years in prison for them for the same crime of seizure of assets, but places them one step below, as co-authors of the framework that the actress launched.

The tax bill

The Superior Court of Justice of Madrid explains the origin of the battle of Bárbara Rey with the Tax Agency in two sentences to which El Confidencial has had access. The facts date back to 2011, when the Treasury carried out an inspection for the years 2006, 2007 and 2008. The vedette was registered under heading 13, which corresponds to “film and theater actors”, but they suspected that she was using two companies —Producciones Rey and Imagen Porla— to pay less taxes.

The underlying debate is similar to the one that has affected various actors who, instead of paying personal income tax for their salary, collected through companies and paid Corporate Tax. Recommended for years by a multitude of tax advisers, they managed to pay around half, but the system began to break down in 2009. The Treasury then focused on this practice and it was Bárbara Rey's turn: in 2013, after two years of inspection, the Tax Agency concluded that she had to pay more than 370,000 euros for the periods between 2006 and 2008.

For this, the Treasury stressed that the income of the companies corresponded almost entirely to the work carried out by the vedette herself.. In 2008, for example, 99% of the operating income of the Imagen Porla company came from “his artistic activity”: appearances on the television programs La Noria, Dónde Estás Corazón, Temporada Alta….

Bárbara Rey appealed these settlement agreements and, in 2017, the case ended up in the Superior Court of Justice of Madrid. In the first sentence, of July 7, the magistrates did not question the arguments of the Tax Agency, but they threw out their 2006 claim because the inspection action “was greater than the legal maximum” and exceeded the statute of limitations. In the second, on October 18, the court followed the same line to overthrow the 2007 settlement agreement, but maintained the 2008 one..

Of the initial more than 370,000 euros, the Prosecutor's Office explains that, in December 2017, the outstanding debt stood at 143,902, but at that point, the amount was already the least of it: by maintaining the settlement and sanction agreements of 2008, still Bárbara Rey could be accused of a crime of confiscation of property.

Prosecutor's invoice

The Prosecutor's investigation is based on what happened from May 10, 2011, when Bárbara Rey was notified of the inspection proceedings at her home. She did not know how much the bill could amount to at that time, but she launched an ordeal and began to carry out a series of operations that, according to the accusation document, pursued a clear objective: “To cause a situation of patrimonial insufficiency that would make it impossible to satisfy the credits claimed”.

The Prosecutor's Office points to 13 operations in just 30 months: the donation of a farm he had in Boadilla del Monte to his daughter Sofía, the “fictitious recognition of a debt” in favor of his sister Petra, the transfer of 99% of the shares de Producciones Rey to her friend Mishell, the constitution of a new company that absorbed the Totana farm with her nephew Fernando as administrator…

The indictment considers that all these movements were “executed in collusion” by the seven defendants, in such a way that, in July 2013, when Bárbara Rey learned that she had to pay more than 370,000 euros, there were no longer “sufficient assets ” to satisfy the debt: “Insolvency situation created”, sums up the Prosecutor's Office.

If the Superior Court of Justice of Madrid manages to knock down the 2008 liquidation, as it did with those of 2006 and 2007, all these operations would have remained an anecdote. However, having escaped the statute of limitations for just a few months, Bárbara Rey will have to sit in the dock with her relatives.

The trial was to be held this Monday at the Provincial Court of Madrid, but legal sources suggest that it had to be postponed because one of the defendants is “whereabouts unknown”.. The outcome will still take several months and, instead of circus tamers, actors or monarchs, it will revolve around a much more mundane issue: attempts to avoid Personal Income Tax (IRPF)..