Overview

• On June 4, Pano told the Supreme Court that entrepreneur Víctor de Aldama informed her in 2020 that ex-Transport Minister José Luis Ábalos received a €500,000 commission for expediting Air Europa’s rescue.
• She clarified she did not witness the payment directly and first repeated the allegation to journalists in 2024.
• Pano testified that Air Europa president Juan José Hidalgo arranged the funds and that they were delivered to Ábalos via his former adviser Koldo García in a sports bag.
• The Supreme Court summoned her at the request of Ábalos’s defense and popular accusations to verify her previous statements under oath.
• Leonor González Pano and her mother, Carmen Pano, remain under investigation in a related hydrocarbons fraud case before the National Court.