Liliane Dahlmann, the widow of Luisa Isabel Álvarez de Toledo – known as the Red Duchess – was sentenced this Wednesday, February 14, by the Provincial Court of Cádiz to six months in prison and compensation for the firstborn son of the Duchess of Toledo in Medina Sidonia (Estoril, 1936 – Sanlúcar, 2008), Leoncio-Alonso González de Gregorio, with 278,678 euros plus interest for a crime of embezzlement.
As explained in a note from the law firm Talin Ferreiro, which represents the son of the Duchess of Fernandina – also Princess of Montalbán, Marchioness of Villafranca del Bierzo, Marchioness of Los Vélez and holder of eleven other noble titles in Italy and six in Spain – Dahlmann was charged with Convicted of embezzlement for “confiscating all the money deposited in her accounts at a London bank after the death of Luisa Isabel Álvarez de Toledo.”
According to the defense of the current Duke of Medina Sidonia, “this amount of almost 280,000 euros was awarded in the inheritance to Leoncio Alonso González de Gregorio to settle inheritance debts, but it was withheld by the widow under the pretext.” It was an account which belonged jointly to both of them, although she herself had admitted that the only funds deposited in this account were those of the Duchess of Medina Sidonia.”
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The trial took place last November, when Lilian Dahlmann's lawyer defended that the complaint had an “instrumental purpose” aimed at “her removal as president of the Casa Medina Sidonia Foundation.” [creada en 1990 para proteger y difundir el patrimonio histórico de su familia]”To legally disqualify her and let Leoncio (the Duchess's eldest son and complainant) take over the position, there is nothing more.” In addition, he assured that his client “never had the intention of acquiring anything or hiding money “. In this sense, the lawyer explained: “In 2008 she [Lilian Dahlmann] He was co-owner of the bank accounts in the United Kingdom and France, but when the Duchess died and the inheritance was distributed, he renounced the balances of these accounts and handed them over to the executors, leaving him no longer able to dispose of the funds. . , so he can’t give the money back to the kids because it’s not his.”
For his part, the prosecutor defended that the Duchess's widow – they married shortly before her death in 2008 – knew that she had to pay back the disputed 350,000 euros to the Duchess's first-born son and yet had not yet done so. had done so “more than a decade later.” The accusation made by Leoncio-Alonso González de Gregorio's lawyer even went so far that he accused Dahlmann in the trial of having emptied the accounts, “and now he acts as if the money was in a kind of suspended state and he hadn't touched it .” The prosecution requested a prison sentence of three years for the widow of the Duchess of Medina Sidonia, while the heir's son requested a prison sentence of up to six years. Lilian Dahlmann, for her part, defended that the money had “moved to other accounts and other shares” of which she was no longer a co-owner. “I have lived in Sanlúcar de Barrameda for more than 40 years and I insist that I have never had anything left,” he explained.
The prison sentence now imposed by the Third Department of the Provincial Court of Cádiz is less than requested, although the order also provides for a specific deprivation of the right to stand for election for the duration of the conviction, equivalent to a fine of three months in the amount of 1,350 euros and to The compensation amounting to 278,678.32 euros is supplemented by statutory interest and procedural costs calculated in accordance with the statutory provisions. From 2008 to the present, her heirs have repeatedly denounced the operations carried out by Liliane Dahlmann in court, with the aim of allegedly disinheriting her. In recent years, a court in Sanlúcar de Barrameda and in 2018 the court of Cádiz recognized the claim to the rightful part of the inheritance of the oldest ducal house in Spain to the three children of the Red Duchess and rejected them – the three brothers Leoncio Alonso, Gabriel and Pilar – sued the foundation's current chairman because of the inheritance brokered by their mother, which gave them 743,000 euros, 1.3% of the agreed sum. After learning of this Monday's verdict, which according to the statement of the current Duke's law firm they consider “satisfactory”, the private prosecution of the lawyer from A Coruña Eduardo Ferreiro Pérez has announced that he will appeal to the Supreme Court a conviction, which is rather adjusted because of what it regards as facts of notorious gravity.”