Staff from businesses hired for referendum material testify

Employee from graphic design company denies knowing who ordered the material produced by the firm and says no money changed hands

HR manager Rosa Maria Sans gave a short testimony at the Supreme Court on Tuesday
HR manager Rosa Maria Sans gave a short testimony at the Supreme Court on Tuesday / ACN

ACN | Madrid

March 12, 2019 12:08 PM

"I never saw the material, it was sealed," Rosa María Sans, from the Artyplan graphic design company, told the Supreme Court on Tuesday, as the trial of Catalan leaders continued with testimony from firms hired to produce material for the 2017 independence referendum.

In the shortest court session so far, Sans, who was head of HR at the firm, confirmed that the company received orders to produce material for the vote, but she added that she did not know "where the orders came from."

She also said that even though the company she worked for allegedly printed the material, which was seized by Spanish police in raids of the firm, the first she saw of it was later in the media, not in the company itself.

Sans explained that it turned out that the billing for the material was for the pro-independence organization Òmnium Cultural, which she described as a "client of many years," but who in this case did not pay anything to the company.

Before Sans took the stand, the owner of the Buzoneo Directo company, José Oriol González, was due to give testimony, but he refused to declare as he is currently under investigation in a separate case.

The trial will resume at 4pm on Tuesday, with prosecutors cross-examining Enric Vidal Famadas, a designer who allegedly acted as an intermediary between the Catalan government and private companies.