Your trusted source

A court in Spain on Friday dropped the most serious charge facing Princess Cristina, a sister of King Felipe VI, raising the possibility that she could avoid a court trial in a financial scandal, CNN reported.

The Provincial Court in Palma de Mallorca threw out a charge of money laundering but allowed two charges of tax fraud to stand, according to the court order.

It was not immediately clear whether the alleged crimes, as charged, would mean a trial for the princess. A magistrate who has been investigating the financial scandal for several years will have to determine whether to do so, an official at the court told CNN.

A court trial of a member of the Spanish royal family would be unprecedented.

The case centers on the nonprofit Noos foundation, which received millions of dollars in government contracts to stage sports and tourism events.

The magistrate, Judge Jose Castro, investigated whether part of that money may have been diverted for private use by the princess and her husband, Inaki de Urdangarin, who is also charged. Through their legal teams, both have denied any wrongdoing.

Before the three-judge panel issued its 160-page ruling Friday -- in response to appeals by various parties to the case -- the court official, by custom not identified, had told CNN that the princess almost certainly would have faced trial if the court had upheld all three charges against her.

But since only the two counts of alleged tax fraud still stand, Castro must decide whether to apply a legal precedent in Spain that if the state prosecutor wasn't pressing charges for tax fraud, which is the situation for the princess, then no trial would be held.

A small union called Manos Limpias, or Clean Hands, is alone in pressing the tax fraud charges against her, as a kind of private prosecution, permitted in Spain.

The Supreme Court previously ruled in a separate case that a private charge alone was not strong enough to force a tax fraud trial.

Urdangarin and some 15 other defendants who are charged in the case are expected to face trial, the court official said. The judge has not set a trial date yet.