Colombian singer Shakira has agreed to pay a fine of over €7.3 million ($7.98 million) to settle a tax fraud case with Spanish prosecutors to avoid trial for tax fraud, a Barcelona court said Monday.
Gatekeepers News reports that the deal also includes a three-year suspended sentence for the 46 year-old.
Prosecutors had accused Shakira of defrauding the Spanish state of €14.5 million ($15.7 million) on income earned between 2012 and 2014, charges she denied, stating that she only moved to Spain full-time in 2015.
The case focused on the amount of time Shakira spent in Spain during the mentioned period. The settlement allows her to avoid trial, and she expressed the desire to move past the emotional toll of the case for the sake of her two sons, Milan and Sasha.
“I need to move past the stress and emotional toll of the last several years and focus on the things I love – my kids and all the opportunities to come in my career, including my upcoming world tour and my new album,” she said in the statement issued by her lawyers.
“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.”
Spanish authorities alleged Shakira Isabel Mebarak Ripoll spent more than half of that period in Spain and therefore should have paid taxes in the country.
They say she moved to Spain after her relationship with former FC Barcelona star defender Gerard Pique became public in 2011, but maintained official tax residency in the Bahamas until 2015.
Shakira’s lawyers argued that until 2014, she was leading a “nomadic life” and earned most of her money from international tours, and that she moved permanently to Barcelona just before the birth of her second son in January 2015.
The diva announced her split from Pique in June 2022 after a decade-long relationship, ending what had been one of the world’s most famous celebrity couples. She moved to Miami in April with their two sons, Milan and Sasha.
Her trial had been expected to run until December 14, with the court scheduled to hear from nearly 120 witnesses.
Questions about Shakira’s finances have been raised before.The Latina superstar was named in one of the largest-ever leaks of financial documents in October 2021, known as the “Pandora Papers”, which revealed the wealth and tax avoidance strategies of the global rich, in her case relating to residence in the Bahamas.
