Laurence Dollimore
THE so-called ‘cocaine chauffeur’ who spent €1 million of taxpayers’ cash on organising drug-fuelled parties for corrupt politicians has finally been jailed.
Juan Francisco Trujillo last month admitted his role in the shocking €1billion ERE corruption scheme, which took place in the southernmost region of Andalucia between 2000 and 2010.
Trujillo told judges how he spent up to €25,000 a month on booze and cocaine for himself and his former boss, Employment Minister Javier Guerrero.
READ MORE: EXPLAINER: What was the ERE scandal which rocked Andalucia in the early 2000s?
At a rate of ‘five to 10 grams’ a day, he admitted he spent €1,475,000 in state subsidies over just a couple of years.
He was today jailed for four years and nine months for embezzlement and a string of other charges, and is banned from public office for at least seven years.
The sentence is much lower than the 14 years sought by prosecutors at a court in Sevilla, the region’s capital.
His ex-boss, Guerrero, who died in 2020, played a central role in the pilfering of around €680 million from public coffers as the local minister responsible for distributing EU funds.
Trujillo colluded with Guerro to set up bogus firms in order to benefit from a Brussels subsidy of €450,000 per company.
The millions of euros in EU funds were then snaffled up and spent on coke for himself and Guerrero, who had awarded him the cash, as well as purchasing land and building a house.
He also spent €70,000 on paintings, watches, a piano, clothes and mobile phones.
“I continue to admit my guilt,” Trujillo previously told the court, after avoiding jail when an official judicial investigation into the scandal concluded six years ago.
