Shakira arrives at court for £12.7m tax trial as she faces eight years in prison
SHAKIRA has confessed to six counts of tax fraud in a last-minute deal to avoid jail over allegations she failed to pay bills totalling £12.7million.
"I admire tremendously those who have fought these injustices to the end, but for me, today, winning is getting my time back for my kids and my career.”She said: “I have to choose my battles and the most important thing for me right now is that my children live a full life and I focus on what is really important: watching them grow and spending time with them, without submitting them to the anguish of seeing their mother in a court trial with the damage that causes.
The full amount of the fine Shakira will have to pay to avoid doing effective prison time was not announced in open court.and disappeared into the building, looking calm and relaxed.Spanish state prosecutors announced in a pre-trial indictment they were seeking an eight-year, two-month jail term for Shakira and a fine of nearly £21 million if judges found her guilty of six counts of tax fraud she allegedly committed in 2012, 2013 and 2014.
The prosecution case centres on a rebuttal of Shakira’s assertion she was a resident in the Bahamas between the start of 2012 and the end of 2014 and shouldn’t have been considered a Spanish resident for tax purposes despite starting to date her ex-Gerard Pique in 2010.
People who spend more than 183 days in a given calendar year in Spain are considered Spanish residents for tax purposes and under the country’s tax rules are obliged to declare their worldwide earnings. A statement released by Shakira’s Barcelona-based publicists LLYC in November last year said: “Shakira is a taxpayer who has always shown impeccable tax conduct and has never had tax problems in any other jurisdiction.“She never exceeded the 183 days of presence in Spain required to be a tax resident.
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