Thanks to the fact that the right at that time wanted to bite Felipe very badly all the illegal activities of GAL were knwown to everyone and there was a huge reaction.
It was only after 1989, when PSOE had a thin (but absolute) majority and Aznar was leader of the reconstituted (post-Franquista) PP, that the right and El Mundo started using the court cases to bring Felipe down. In the end, Barrionuevo and Vera were found guilty of misappropriation of funds, but as much as Damborenea tried to argue that they (and Felipe) knew about GAL there was really no evidence of it.
It is telling that Galindo was "promoted" out of the Basque Country, which was also rather shameful but probably politically necessary. guaranteed to evoke a violent reaction from police is to challenge their right to "define the situation." --- David Graeber citing Marc Cooper
A pleasure I therefore claim to show, not how men think in myths, but how myths operate in men's minds without their being aware of the fact. Levi-Strauss, Claude