The Dana judge has placed President Carlos Mazón in the spotlight. Although the head of the Consell has some protection by holding the status of authorized person, the magistrate has chosen to focus on the calls that the president had with the then councilor Salomé Pradas (investigated in the procedure) from the El Ventorro restaurant, where he shared a table and tablecloth with the journalist Maribel Vilaplana for three and a half hours. The magistrate, in an order issued this Monday, recalls that Mazón holds the status of “highest authority” of the Generalitat Valenciana and “has been assigned” by law the “directive and coordination functions” of the regional Executive, “so that he can give instructions to the members of the Consell.” The counselor and her boss spoke for a total of 10 minutes and 16 seconds in just over an hour, at key moments in the emergency response.
The judge has requested that the president's call list that the Presidency sent to the investigation commission of the Valencian Courts be incorporated into the procedure. It is, according to the judge, a “public document.”
The order frames Carlos Mazón's calls incorporated into the summary in the “analysis in the decision-making process” at the meeting of the Integrated Operational Coordination Center (Cecopi) on October 29.
The resolution has been issued on the instructor's own initiative. This is not a procedure proposed by any of the numerous accusations brought forward in the case.
Furthermore, with the unanimous endorsement of the second section of the Provincial Court of Valencia, which on October 16 ordered that journalist Maribel Vilaplana be summoned as a witness. This is a procedure that, despite the measurement, may be relevant “and useful to the investigation,” the Valencia Court maintained.
The document incorporated into the procedure details the calls recorded on the president's telephone terminal. And it complements the notarial act that Pradas voluntarily provided with his calls (published in full by elDiario.es).
This last document, one of the most relevant pieces of evidence in the case, states that at 4:29 p.m., the then councilor was unable to speak with Carlos Mazón (there is a “cancelled call”). At that moment, an hour had already passed since the Generalitat activated the Military Emergency Unit (UME) for Utiel, a completely flooded town. The Cecopi was called for 5:00 p.m.
The first call: at 5:37 p.m.
More than half an hour after the start of the coordination meeting, Pradas was finally able to speak with Mazón. It was she who called him at 5:37 p.m.; They talked for two minutes. At that time, the Júcar Hydrographic Confederation (CHJ) had warned of the potentially catastrophic situation at the Forata dam.
Although the judge only focuses on the calls between Carlos Mazón and Salomé Pradas, the order alludes to the “analysis of decision-making” within Cecopi and, specifically, the sending of Es-Alert to the population. And Mazón, according to the list of his calls, also spoke at 5:46 p.m. with Vicente Mompó, who just at that precise moment arrived at the L'Eliana Emergency Coordination Center, where the Cecopi meeting was taking place. Two minutes later he spoke again with Mompó.
The president of the provincial institution, whose calls were compared in court, said it was to give the head of the Consell the telephone number of the mayor of Utiel, Ricardo Gabaldón. However, Mazón's list of calls does not include any with the town's first mayor, from his same party.
The longest call with Mazón, at 6:16 p.m.
The next call from Pradas to Mazón was at 6:16 p.m. and lasted seven minutes (it was the longest of that day between the president and his counselor).
At 6:25 p.m., Mazón called Pradas for just 43 seconds. Also to the president of the Provincial Council, with whom he spoke again two minutes later. At 6:28 p.m., he telephoned the mayor of Cullera, Jordi Mayor, who was not participating in Cecopi and whose call, therefore, could not be asked during the testimony of witness Maribel Vilaplana.
At 6:30 p.m., two minutes later, Salomé Pradas called Mazón and spoke with him for 33 seconds. Journalist Maribel Vilaplana, according to her latest version of the events, left the restaurant “between 6:30 and 6:45 p.m.” She was then accompanied by the president on foot to a nearby parking lot.