Searches, arrests and requests for records
National Court judge Ismael Moreno ordered the operation, which the Guardia Civil's Central Operational Unit (UCO) conducted in coordination with the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office. Agents carried out searches and other investigative actions across Madrid, Córdoba, Valencia and Seville.
Andrea de la Torre, Ábalos's partner, was at his Valencia home when agents searched it. She was taken to Guardia Civil offices, where she exercised her right not to testify. The other detainees were Córdoba businessman Cristian Corvillo, his brother Rubén and three other businessmen. All six were released after the statement-taking process.
The visits to Adif and Grupo Azvi involved requests for documents. Adif said it supplied the requested contract records at its Madrid offices and cooperated with investigators, emphasizing that its premises were not searched. Grupo Azvi also acknowledged receiving a request but declined to describe the material sought because the proceedings are sealed.
According to La Voz de Galicia and ARA, the operation took place hours after Adif president Luis Pedro Marco de la Peña resigned and Transport Minister Óscar Puente left office following the October 28, 2026, Urda rail disaster, which killed 69 people. It also came during the pre-campaign period for the November 29 elections.
A sealed inquiry into suspected commissions
Moreno opened the separate branch after receiving a new UCO report. La Voz de Galicia, citing a court order it reviewed, identifies it as branch number eight, titled "Contratos obra pública," within preliminary proceedings 65/2023. The document that prompted it was report 168/26 from the UCO's Economic Crime area, IUAFAC.
Legal sources cited by EFE place the new inquiry within the investigation into alleged commissions on public-works contracts awarded during Ábalos's tenure at the Transport Ministry. Investigators are considering possible influence peddling, criminal organization, money laundering and tax fraud. Neither the full police report nor the details of the investigative measures have been disclosed.
About 15 people were already under investigation in the broader public-works branch, including Ábalos, former Adif president Isabel Pardo de Vera and former PSOE organization secretary Santos Cerdán. Separating some of that work into a new branch does not establish that everyone in the broader inquiry is involved in the November 5 proceedings.
The specific contracts and administrative files targeted by the new branch remain undisclosed. So do the amounts allegedly paid in commissions, the financial transactions investigators may have identified and the roles attributed to individual suspects. The releases do not end the inquiry, and the conduct under investigation has not been established as proven.
What the broader public-works case covers
The wider investigation has a publicly reported scope distinct from the still-secret details of the new branch. According to El Mundo, it examines 11 contract awards totaling 900 million euros. A 490-page UCO report submitted to the Supreme Court on June 5, 2025, alleged that the Transport Ministry repeatedly favored certain companies between 2018 and 2021.
El Mundo also reported findings by the Intervención General de la Administración del Estado (IGAE), whose review was commissioned by the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office and reached the National Court in March. That report found irregularities in all 11 contracts: five at Adif and six at the Directorate-General of Roads. Its findings included modifications that increased budgets by nearly 20% in the five awards won by Acciona.
La Voz de Galicia identified Acciona Construcción, Levantina Ingeniería y Construcción (LIC) and Obras Públicas y Regadíos (OPR) among the companies named in judicial rulings in the public-works branch.
The newspaper also cited police reports stating that Acciona or projects linked to it accounted for 87.04% of Servinabar's income. According to the same reporting, the UCO calculated that Cerdán and some relatives allegedly received benefits worth at least 323,178.41 euros between 2015 and 2024.
Grupo Azvi had previously come under scrutiny in the public-works inquiry after Víctor de Aldama submitted documents to the Supreme Court in December 2024 concerning allegedly irregular awards. Aldama claimed that company executives had been in contact with him and Koldo García. Azvi denied those allegations. What investigators now hope to establish from the records requested from Azvi and Adif has not been made public.
Cristian Corvillo's earlier links to the investigation
Cristian Corvillo belongs to the PSOE's Ciudad Jardín grouping in Córdoba. Earlier reporting on the case had linked him to Koldo García and Víctor de Aldama.
According to La Voz de Galicia, an October 2024 UCO report described Corvillo as acting under Aldama's direction in efforts to purchase a chalet in La Alcaidesa, Cádiz. The property was worth more than half a million euros and was allegedly intended for Ábalos.
Corvillo has also been mentioned in connection with driving Pedro Sánchez's vehicle during the PSOE's 2017 leadership primary. The PSOE denied that he had served as Sánchez's driver on official government or party trips.
Other inquiries and unresolved questions
The Koldo case began with pandemic-era mask contracts before expanding into other investigations. A separate, sealed National Court inquiry concerns cash payments the PSOE made from 2017 through 2024 to reimburse expenses advanced by party officials. Its purpose differs from that of the proceedings behind the November 5 operation.
The next unresolved step in the new public-works branch is the assessment of seized documents and devices. Further judicial decisions, and any eventual lifting of secrecy, may clarify the evidence investigators have gathered and the scope of the allegations.
