Rita Barberá

María Rita Barberá Nolla (16 July 1948 – 23 November 2016) was the Mayor of Valencia, Spain from 1991 until 2015. Born in Valencia, she was a member of the National Council of the People's Party of Spain and was a Representative in the Valencian regional Parliament (Corts Valencianes). She turned down an offer to become a national deputy at the 2008 Spanish General Election, but she was made a senator by her party after she lost the 2015 municipal elections. As such, she was only answerable to the Tribunal Supremo, and the ordinary judge in charge of the Taula corruption case could therefore not indict her like the rest of her team. On 21 April 2016, the investigating judge therefore requested her indictment for money laundering to the Tribunal Supremo. On 13 September 2016 the Tribunal Supremo opened a formal investigation, usually the step before an indictment, and the People's Party asked her to resign her senate seat. She chose instead to leave the party and to become an independent senator, remaining answerable only to the Tribunal Supremo and keeping her salary. Until her death, she continued to socialize and vote with the party that she had formally left.

Barberá died in Madrid on 23 November 2016 of a heart attack as a result of hepatic cirrhosis. She was in the process of being investigated for money laundering at the time, and had testified to the Tribunal Supremo only two days prior to her death.