Outraged village mayor faces trial over leaflets

OJEN Mayor Jose Antonio Gomez will face trial for having allegedly forced local police officers to deliver political propaganda.

Gomez, whose case is due to be heard in a Marbella court in June, is charged with misappropriation of public funds after the opposition party and an independent police union reported he was making officers distribute local newsletters clearly praising the local council and giving the opposition a bad name.

The PSOE party socialist mayor declared that the case was all a ploy to discredit him just before the local elections, stressing that police officers had been used to deliver council reports since 2008 and nobody had ever complained about it before.

Gomez explained that he intended to sue whoever was behind the reports for making false accusations, and said his legal costs would be covered by council funds as the case concerned his duties as mayor of the village.