Photo Credit: Shakira111 / CC by 4.0
Prosecutors in Barcelona have charged Shakira with tax fraud to the tune of $7.1 million, alleging that the Colombian singer used an offshore company to avoid paying her 2018 taxes.
Spanish prosecutors are charging pop singer Shakira with failure to pay $7.1 million in taxes, according to Barcelona authorities. They allege the singer used an offshore company in a “tax haven” to avoid paying taxes on her 2018 income. This follows the charges she faces in a separate case, also in Barcelona, alleging her failure to pay $15.4 in owed taxes, for which she is being tried on November 20.
Tax officials opened the latest case against the Colombian singer in July, having reviewed the evidence and deciding to press charges. A trial date is yet to be set. Llorente y Cuenca, the PR firm that has been handling Shakira’s affairs, said in July that the singer had “always acted in concordance with the law and on the advice of her financial advisers.”
The case tied to the November 20 trial hinges on Shakira’s place of residence from 2012 to 2014, as prosecutors allege the artist spent more than half of that period in Spain, and should therefore have paid taxes in the country, despite her official residence at the time in the Bahamas.
The fiscal allegations against Shakira — who has lived in Barcelona for the past 11 years with former soccer player Gerard Pique and their two children until last year when the couple separated — follow Spain’s tax authorities’ crackdown within the last decade on soccer stars failing to pay their full due in taxes.
Stars like Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo were found guilty of tax evasion, but evaded prison time because of a provision allowing a judge to waive sentences under two years for first-time offenders. Shakira was notified of the charges against her in Miami, where she currently lives.
