Julián Contreras, the youngest son of the late Spanish socialite Carmina Ordóñez, has denied giving an interview in which he was reported to have criticised his half-brothers, bullfighters Fran Rivera and Cayetano Rivera, insisting the comments attributed to him came from a private conversation that was published without his consent.
Contreras, a businessman who has kept a low profile online and largely away from the press in recent months while his older siblings continue to make headlines, returned to social media after several months' absence to issue a statement. It was not the first time he has disowned comments the media reported him as making.
What Contreras was reported to have said
The controversy began after Contreras reportedly spoke exclusively to Venezuelan journalist Aurelio Manzano about his mother's final moments, how he coped with her loss, and his current relationship with his siblings. In the remarks attributed to him, he said he felt displaced from the family and accused his siblings of having turned their back on him, adding that some relatives had provoked the rift while others had allowed it to happen.
The entertainment programme Fiesta, broadcast on Telecinco, one of Spain's main private television networks, interpreted the comments as identifying Fran Rivera as the brother who had acted against him and Cayetano Rivera as the one who had stayed silent and let it happen. According to the programme, Contreras had also recalled that Fran had devoted himself to caring for their mother, a line the show's panel read as a veiled criticism of Cayetano, suggesting Fran had stood by her while his other brother had not.
The Ordóñez-Rivera family
Fran Rivera and Cayetano Rivera are prominent Spanish bullfighters, sons of Ordóñez and the matador Francisco Rivera, known professionally as Paquirri. Paquirri, one of the best known bullfighters of his generation, died in 1984 after being gored during a fight in Pozoblanco, a death that made headlines across Spain. Contreras is Ordóñez's youngest son, from a later relationship with businessman José María Contreras. Ordóñez, the daughter of the celebrated bullfighter Antonio Ordóñez, whose rivalry with fellow matador Luis Miguel Dominguín was chronicled by the writer Ernest Hemingway, was a well known figure in Spanish celebrity media until her death.
Contreras denies the interview
Faced with the reaction his reported comments provoked, Contreras issued a statement insisting the conversation with Manzano had been private and that he had never given permission for it to be published. He said that in 2026, however hard it was to believe, some people still considered it acceptable to make television using private conversations that had been expressly requested not to be shared.
He said that in speaking with a celebrity journalist and answering his questions, he had believed he was dealing with someone acting out of personal interest rather than exercising his profession.
Contreras also said that in the hours before his statement, remarks had been attributed to him that he had never made, either in public or in private. He said a narrative had, once again, been built that did not come from his own words but from a malicious interpretation entirely unrelated to them.
He said he would not stay silent and intended to tell his version of events to anyone willing to listen. He urged his followers to watch a video he planned to post on his channel that evening, in which he would lay out, with evidence, context and a chronology, what had actually happened. He said people could then draw their own conclusions, adding that reporting something was one thing, and attributing words to someone that they had never said was quite another.
A pattern of public disputes
The episode is the latest flashpoint in what has become an escalating public feud between Contreras and his half-brothers. He has previously said he regrets that his misfortunes have proven profitable for others but not for him, and has accused Fran Rivera and his wife, Lourdes Montes, of not caring that he had once come close to taking his own life. The dispute follows a string of earlier public disagreements between the siblings reported in recent months.
A painful anniversary
The renewed dispute broke out during a weekend already dominated by discussion of Carmina Ordóñez, who died 22 years ago. Her close friend Eva Carreño had denounced what she described as irregularities surrounding Ordóñez's death, alleging a failure to provide assistance and saying more people had been present in the home at the time she died. The claims reopened a painful chapter for her children.
