Ronald Priestley, 69, of Colton, Leeds, fled to Spain in 2005 after masterminding a £4.25m counterfeit banknote fraud.

He was sentenced to eight years in jail in his absence and was finally arrested when Spanish police swooped on a villa in Marbella earlier this month.Priestley was the subject of a world-wide man hunt after failing to attend a Leeds Crown Court hearing in August 2005, where he faced charges of conspiracy to counterfeit £20 banknotes with a face value of £4.25m.He returned to the court yesterday to formally begin his original sentence with an appearance before the Recorder of Leeds, Judge Peter Collier.On November 2, he will return to face the judge at his original trial, Judge Geoffrey Marson QC, over additional charges concerning breach of bail.
Priestley, who lived in a luxury home on Park Road, had a criminal past in counterfeiting long before 2005.In December 2002, he was stripped of more than £2.2m at Bradford Crown Court after police raids netted 138,000 bottles of fake perfumes and 1,500 bottles of Spanish sparkling wine relabelled as Moet et Chandon champagne.
In April that year, he was jailed for 18 months after admitting three counts of conspiracy to sell or distribute counterfeit goods - but was released early from jail.Priestley was arrested as part of crime-fighting charity Crimestoppers' Operation Captura, which has identified criminals living in Spain wanted in the UK. He was featured in the campaign's first top 10 appeal in October 2006.

Read More

Death in the Sun as man was gored to death on Saturday at a bull-running festival in Peñafiel, Valladolid

53 year old man was gored to death on Saturday at a bull-running festival in Peñafiel, Valladolid. It happened after the first bull run of this year’s festivities at the ‘capea’ bullfight, when amateurs try out their skills against the young bulls.The man, from Dueñas, in Palencia, was gored in the abdomen and died as he was being rushed to hospital in Valladolid. His death came a little over a month after 27 year old Daniel Jimeno Romero was fatally gored at this year’s San Fermín bull run festival in Pamplona.Two others were gored in the shoulder and a leg during the morning’s bull run in Peñafiel.Elsewhere in Valladolid, another man was gored on Saturday in the first bull run at a local festival in Tudela de Duero. And on Sunday, a 16 year old boy was seriously hurt in the first bull run of the day in Leganés when he was gored in the left side of his chest. He is a local boy named by El Mundo as A.E.D.The Equanimal organisation chose the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao for another anti-bullfighting protest this Saturday, where 100 demonstrators lay down on the ground outside the building. Clad in only black boxer shorts, they lay face down covered with artificial blood and banderillas on their backs, simulating all the bulls which will die during the city’s Semana Grande festivities. The top bullfighter, José Pedro Prados, El Fundi, is in Intensive Care after being charged by a bull at the city’s bullring on Saturday.

Read More

Cocaine Bermudas arrested at Barcelona Airport

Drug smugglers are seeking ever more inventive ways of smuggling cocaine into the country with two recent cases highlighted by the EFE news agency. The first was in Tarragona last week, where a man from Ghana was arrested at the city’s port with 2.6 kilos of cocaine hidden in a women’s girdle strapped to his body. He’d been passed the drugs in a toilet by the Filipino crew member of an Italian ship who’d smuggled the cocaine on board the ship in Costa Rica.And a 65 year old man from Germany was arrested at Barcelona Airport last Saturday from a flight from South America with 6.6 kilos of cocaine in a specially-designed pair of shorts worn beneath his trousers. The rather bulky item of clothing incorporated dozens of small cylinders designed to hold the drugs in an attempt smuggle them through Customs at El Prat.

Read More

Addictions International offers a range of services to expats with addiction problems.

Addictions International offers a range of services to expats with addiction problems. Because of the unique delivery of our programme we are able to support people wherever they may be. Our programme is exceptional in that we can reach people with problems even when they cannot access help in the usual ways.
» People living in rural areas with inadequate public transport or with issues surrounding confidentiality within that setting;
» The need to continue in employment for personal or family reasons;
» Individuals who are housebound - or have mobility issues caused by disability or age;
» People engaged in sensitive employment e.g. key public sector employment status, senior executives in the private sector, professionals- including medics and lawyers etc., entrepreneurs, and people in the public-eye;
contact:email,copsandbloggers@gmail.com

Read More

1,400 luxury homes in El Paraíso

An agreement was due to be signed in Estepona this Monday which will allow the Saudi royal family to go ahead with a project to build 1,400 luxury properties in the area of El Paraíso.La Opinión de Málaga reports it as a project previously approved by the Town Hall, but which was put on hold last June with the arrests in the Astapa corruption case. Some amendments have been made since then, including, at the request of the Partido Popular, a new road to connect the new urbanisation with other areas nearby. The Saudi royal family have also accepted to cede 30,000 square metres of land for public facilities.The paper said work could start at the beginning of next year, bringing much-needed employment in the local construction sector.

Read More

British man accused by the business owner of stealing a barrel of beer worth 600 €.

British man named by Ideal newspaper as Leslie James B. has been arrested by the Almería Civil Guard for a spate of thefts from a business in Turre and selling the stolen items on to beach restaurants in Mojácar. He’s accused, according to Europa Press, of passing off cakes he allegedly stole from the shop as ones he had made himself.He was caught red-handed gaining access to the premises via a terrace and leaving with his haul. The suspect is reported to have a previous record for theft, and is also accused by the business owner of stealing a barrel of beer worth 600 €.

Read More

Body found in the Alicante mountains where Michael Egglestone disappeared

Body found in the Alicante mountains where a British holidaymaker disappeared at the end of May is not believed to be that of the missing man, the UK Northern Echo reports this Thursday. The newspaper spoke to residents of Benichembla, where Michael Egglestone was staying when he disappeared, who said they had been told by the Guardia Civil that the body found on the mountains had not yet been identified. The newspaper said it’s believed to be a local man, and was being transferred for autopsy in Dénia on Wednesday night.52 year old ex soldier, Michael Leslie Eggleston, was last seen on 31st May when he set off on a hiking trip from Benichembla, a village where almost half the 750 or so inhabitants are foreign residents. He’s reported to be an experienced walker and set off well-prepared for the trip. A Civil Guard search has so far failed to find any trace of him and his wife, Janice, returned home to Nettlesworth, in the North East, this Wednesday night. She’s believed to have helped in the search for her missing husband, the paper said.The couple have two children and are reported to have been married for around 10 years.

Read More

Top-level prostitution in Elche

Residents of a building in Elche, only constructed 18 months ago, say they have been fighting top-level prostitution in the block for the past five months.It’s because one of the flats on the fifth floor has become a luxury prostitution venue, and sees a never ending parade of prostitutes and their clients. The residents say they often have to put up with ‘unpleasant comments’ and so now they have started to protest by putting banners over their balconies saying ‘whores out’ and even hanging up some blow-up dolls. They have spent 19,000 € on a new video camera security system and a private guard, in an effort to intimidate possible clients heading for the 5th floor. One of the people thought to have rented the premises concerned told Público newspaper that they are doing no damage and bother nobody. 'When a client comes they ring the bell and the door opens, no more', and that they only operate from 11am to 11pm.

Read More

Michael Leslie Eggleston went missing in the Alicante village of Benigembla a week ago

Guardia Civil has been continuing its search for the 54 year old British hiker who went missing in the Alicante village of Benigembla a week ago.Ex Soldier, Michael Leslie Eggleston, has not been seen since last Sunday when he went out hiking.
His wife reported his disappearance on Tuesday, but so far the search, using mountain teams and a helicopter, has revealed nothing. It is concentrated in the mountain areas of La Solana and La Laguna.Benigembla is a village with some 750 residents, 45% of them are foreign residents, mostly from the EU.

Read More

Vladimirs Mitrevics, alias Podsolnukh (sunflower), a resident of Latvia, and Russian citizen Maxim Tarnopolsky detained

A multiple offender from Latvia and a Russian gangster, formerly a resident of Latvia, were arrested in Ecuador last week along with another citizen of Russia and three Ecuador citizens on the charges of large-scale drug smuggling, informs LETA.
The six were detained by Ecuador Police at Guayaquil Port after a ship sailing under the Spanish flag, that was taking 21 tons of molasses to Barcelona, was arrested. Experts later determined that molasses contained 17 tons of cocaine that had been mixed with the molasses.Guayaquil police inform that it is one of the largest drug consignment to be seized in Guayaquil. The Latvian police have not yet commented.One of the detainees is Vladimirs Mitrevics, alias Podsolnukh (sunflower), a resident of Latvia, and Russian citizen Maxim Tarnopolsky who was convicted in Latvia of vehicular manslaughter and sentenced to ten years in prison, after his "Mercedes-Benz G320" veered onto the wrong side of the road and collided with another three cars, killing three and injuring another three people.
In 2001, Tarnopolskis was sentenced to ten years in prison, but he escaped from Vecumnieki Prison in 2005.Mitrevics was charged and tried several times for various crimes, in 2003 he was given a one-year jail sentence, suspended for six months, for unlawful possession of narcotic substances.

Read More

Joseph Jones,and Norman Jones fled to Spain after the killing and were arrested in Marbella on May 1, 2008.

Joseph Jones, 24, from Crescent Road, New Barnet, and Norman Jones, 50, from Dukes Head Yard, Highgate, abducted landscaper and scrap metal dealer John Finney last year because they believed he had stolen their drugs. They drove the 42-year-old father-of-four 30 miles to a business unit in Hertfordshire and tortured him before killing him and mutilating his body. Two weeks later a member of the public discovered Mr Finney's naked remains behind a garage block in Ickleford.
His hands and head have never been found. The father and son were sentenced today at St Albans Crown Court, in Bricket Road, after a jury on Monday found them guilty of murder. Joseph Jones's friend Mark Curran, 28, of Dollis Valley Way, Barnet, and Gary Lattimore, 40, formerly of Littleheath Road, Bexleyheath, were both cleared of murder. Jailing Norman Jones for a minimum of 33 years and his son for a minimum of 30 years, Judge Mr Justice MacDuff said: "You are both evil men with nothing to commend you. “You committed a meticulously planned murder. You decided summarily to execute a man who you thought, rightly or wrong, probably wrongly, had crossed you.
"It is difficult to comprehend how evil you are. You lack any semblance of humanity." Justice MacDuff said he was "close to tears" after reading a family impact statement from the murdered man's father. He added: “You have subjected the Finney family to unimaginable grief, the loss of a proper man and man of real worth." Speaking after the verdict, Mr Finney’s family said: “The past year has been so very hard for us as a family. We have had to try to understand why a loving son and father was taken from us in such a brutal way and come to terms with this immense loss in our lives. “We have been helped by the support shown by many kind-hearted people around us and we would like to thank them. “But nothing can replace John and he will continue to remain so very much in our thoughts and prayers.”
The sentence means Norman Jones, who was worth £7 million will not be eligible to apply for parole until he is 83. He claimed he had made his fortune from horse racing and property development in Spain, but police suspect he made his fortune through crime. Mr Finney was living with his girlfriend in a caravan at Park Farm, Northaw Road West, Northaw, Hertfordshire, when he was abducted in February last year. He had used his truck a few weeks earlier to help tow another vehicle out of a mud-filled ditch at the farm, which had links to the killers. When a consignment of drugs went missing from it, Mr Finney was suspected of being responsible, but police say he was innocent. The killers then set about a plan to exact revenge, using "dirty" mobile phones to make death threats and purchase the van used to abduct Mr Finney, which were later discarded. Mr Finney was dragged from his car at gunpoint at around 7pm on February 29, 2008. He was taken to a specially rented shack in Knowl Piece, Wilbury Way, Hitchin, and murdered. Mr William Harbage QC, prosecuting, asked the jury to conclude that Mr Finney had been shot in the head and wounds on his body indicated he had been tortured. Mr Harbage said: “Mr Finney seriously upset some thoroughly unscrupulous and ruthless people. This was a callous, cold-blooded, pre-meditated execution of a man against whom they bore a grudge." The Joneses fled to Spain after the killing and were arrested in Marbella on May 1, 2008. Detective Chief Inspector Bill Jephson, who led the investigation, said: "John was the victim of a calculated and pre-planned, savage attack. We will never fully understand the motive for such brutality and only those individuals responsible for John's death will know exactly what happened to him. “John was a well-known and respected member of the travelling community, and his death has had a profound impact. I am extremely grateful for their support and cooperation over the last year and for respecting the investigation.” Patrick Fields of the Crown Prosecution Service said: "This was a painstaking enquiry into a particularly brutal and grisly execution of a man who had done nothing wrong." Police believe a fifth person also took part in the murder, who they are still trying to identify.grandson and former son-in-law of gangster Charlie Kray were jailed for a minimum of 63 years Charlie Kray was the elder brother of gangster twins Ronnie and Reggie. He was seen as the quieter one of the trio who brought terror to London in the Sixties. He died aged 73 while serving a 12-year sentence for his part in a drugs plot.

Read More

Raffaele Amato, an alleged boss of the Camorra gang of Naples,nickname is "the Spaniard." He partied in Marbella

Raffaele Amato, involved in a murderous turf war within the Camorra crime syndicate, was picked up Saturday in Marbella in a joint Italy-Spain operation, Naples prosecutor Giovandomenico Lepore said in a statement.Amato is accused of several homicides in connection with a feud dating back to 1991 between two Camorra clans that left more than a dozen people dead, he said.He was a top killer for boss Paolo Di Lauro, who was trying to keep control of the clan from rival Antonio Ruocco, Lepore said.In 2006, Di Lauro was convicted and sentenced to 30 years in prison on charges of Mafia association, extortion and drug trafficking. On Sunday, prosecutors added subsequent charges to his sentence, along with six other people already behind bars.Amato was arrested in Spain in 2005 but was freed a year later on a technicality.The head of the Naples police squad, Vitrorio Pisani, said Amato had since become "the principal, or one of the principal importers of cocaine in Italy."The Camorra, the equivalent of the Sicilian Mafia for the Naples area, controls drug and arms trafficking, prostitution, extortion and illegal betting rackets.

Raffaele Amato, an alleged boss of the Camorra gang of Naples, had made a base in the glitzy coastal resort of Marbella, police say, even earning the nickname, 'the Spaniard.Neapolitan gangsters such as Raffaele Amato, the fugitive boss whom police captured Saturday night in the city of Marbella, have a name for Spain: La Costa Nostra, or Our Coast.The term plays off Cosa Nostra, or "Our Thing," as the mafia is called, and underscores what authorities say: that Spain has become a top foreign base for the Naples underworld, the Camorra, in the last decade. Spanish police have arrested half a dozen suspected Neapolitan crime figures this year alone."They use that name 'Costa Nostra' because it's like a second homeland for them," said Alessandro Pennasilico, an Italian anti-mafia prosecutor in Naples, in an interview. "They like Spain: the climate, the coast, the beaches, because it's close to their culture. And the Camorra goes where there is business. Spain is an important country regarding the trafficking of drugs."Amato's nickname is "the Spaniard." He partied in Marbella, a beachfront refuge of high-rolling international desperados and dubious fortunes. Investigators say he set up multinational cocaine deals in Barcelona. Moving among Spanish hideouts, he allegedly waged a long-distance war for the gloomy housing projects in Naples that are the heart of his empire.And he speaks Spanish, a language that resembles the Neapolitan dialect even more closely than it does Italian, like a native.The capture of Amato is a major victory for Italian anti-mafia investigators. The balding, 44-year-old kingpin gained notoriety for setting off a turf war with a rival clan between 2004 and 2007 that littered the high-rise slums of Naples with 70 bodies. The battle was retold in "Gomorra," a book by journalist Roberto Saviano, and in the recent film of the same name.Intense Camorra activity in Spain reveals evolving alliances and shifts in globalized crime networks, investigators say. Starting about seven years ago, Amato was a key player in a number of decisive underworld sit-downs in Spain, which is the gateway for Latin American cocaine smuggled into Europe, according to Antonio Laudati, a top official in Italy's Justice Ministry and former chief prosecutor in Naples.Europe became an increasingly hot market for cocaine because of rising demand, a strong currency and the hardening of U.S. borders after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Laudati said in a telephone interview. The Neapolitans met with Latin American and Spanish gangsters to build new partnerships and develop the European market, he said."They reorganized the routes," Laudati said. "One important route for cocaine into Spain went through North Africa. Another crossed the Balkans into Italy. And Barcelona became a hub for a land route for cocaine to Italy through France, where the Marseilles underworld has always had close ties to the Camorra. So you had a mixed operational group of bosses base itself in Spain."
The Camorra enlisted Spanish seagoing smugglers and front companies that concealed loads in shipments of products such as marble and seafood, Laudati said. Italian gangs also took advantage of the booms in real estate and construction in Spain to launder millions, according to authorities.Although the Neapolitan crime clans are flashy and murderous at home, they avoided violence in Spain because it was seen as a place to do high-level business and lie low.Nonetheless, the numerous arrests in Spain show that Spanish and Italian law enforcement have developed good cross-border cooperation. Amato was arrested in 2005 in Barcelona, but was released months later because of a judicial error in which the deadline for his prosecution passed by a day.Police began tracking him again in 2006. He lived in southern Spain and used fake Spanish documents to travel to see his family at upscale hotels in London, Tokyo and Turkey, according to Italian authorities and media reports.Last weekend, patient surveillance and wiretaps culminated when Italian and Spanish police trailed Amato on a 30-mile drive along the Mediterranean from Malaga. They arrested him on his way to a Saturday night date in Marbella, the glitzy capital of "his coast."

Read More

Collapse of the pound Holiday makers will still pay around £85 more per €1,000 they spend this year, compared to April 2008

Collapse of the pound against the Dollar, and to a lesser extent the Euro, mean British holiday makers will find their break in the Med, or their Disneyland trip, much more expensive this year.
Research from moneysupermarket.com reveals it will cost Brits nearly £300 more for every $1,500 spent in the States now, compared to this time last year.For European travellers the outlook isn't much better, despite the pound's recent rally against the Euro holiday makers will still pay around £85 more per €1,000 they spend this year, compared to April 2008.Peter Harrison, travel money expert at moneysupermarket.com, said: "There can be no doubt the weakening pound will have a big impact on where people can afford to go on their summer holidays this year. Trips to Europe and America are going to be much more expensive for Brits, so making sure you organise your foreign currency in good time will be more important than ever."Using a credit or debit card which doesn't levy charges for use abroad, such as the Post Office credit card, is often the best way to keep foreign currency costs down."Another option is to get a prepaid card and load it with a set amount of holiday money. The rates on these cards are amongst the best in the market for travel money, and they can help people stick to budgets."

Read More

Action star Dolph Lundgren's wife was left traumatized after robbers tied her up in their home

Action star Dolph Lundgren's wife was left traumatized after robbers tied her up in their home. The masked burglars abandoned the robbery after discovering the house belonged to the "Rocky IV" star.Three armed thieves broke into his Costa del Sol villa and tied his wife Anette, who was alone in the estate. They were terrorizing her into giving them cash, jewelries, and other valuables when they recognized the actor's picture in a family portrait.They quickly abandoned the raid.The 6ft. 5 in. karate black belter, who gained fame playing Russian boxer Ian Drago opposite Sylvester Stallone's Rocky in the film's fourth installment, consoled his wife when she phoned him in tears.A source told the Daily Mail, "Things might have turned out very differently if Dolph had been in.""The criminals fled as soon as they realized the owner of the house they had raided was someone they wouldn't want to come up against in a fight.""They left Anette pretty traumatized. She's Dolph's angel and anyone who messes with her is messing with him."The authorities are currently hunting the three attackers.The source said, "Police have got very few leads. All three burglars wore balaclavas and they've no real description to go on.""They're look at CCTV footage to see if they can advance the inquiry. Dolph's away on business a lot and he's increased security to try to avoid a repeat."Lundgren is currently filming Stallone's "The Expendables" with an all-star cast.

Read More

WARNING:Portuguese man-of-war seen close to the beaches of the Costa del Sol, in southern Spain, and off the coast of Murcia, in the south-east.

Portuguese man-of-war , with their lethal stings, made an unusual incursion into waters normally considered too warm for them.The jellyfish have been seen close to the beaches of the Costa del Sol, in southern Spain, and off the coast of Murcia, in the south-east.
The Portuguese man-of-war, a jelly-like creature, gives a burning sting that is far more painful than that of a jellyfish.In extreme cases, the sting can cause heart attacks in victims who are allergic to it.Westerly winds have blown the Portuguese men-of-war into the Mediterranean through the Strait of Gibraltar and along the length of Spain's southern coast, scientists said."They go wherever they are driven by the wind," Xavier Pastor, of the Oceana NGO organisation, explained."They have little sails and that means that, if the wind is blowing in towards the coast, they end up on the coast."Pastor said groups of the creatures had been seen off Malaga and the Costa del Sol a few weeks ago.The latest sightings, around Murcia, were made by Spain's state-run Oceanography Centre of Murcia.The tentacles of a man-of-war can be 30 metres long and are strung with tiny stinging capsules that survive even when it has been washed up onto shore or if the tentacles have broken off.
The capsules have small triggers that release the stings when they are touched and hang below a pink-tinged blue bubble that acts as the sail.Pastor said there did not appear to be enough of the creatures to form a permanent colony in the Mediterranean but warned of dramatic consequences if they did."It would be a big problem for the tourist industry and for swimmers," he said. "This is far worse than having jellyfish."

Read More

Arrested a taxi driver who is accused of raping a British tourist in the Marbella hotel

On Tuesday the woman, who is around 50 years old, had lunch in a restaurant in Marbella and then asked for a taxi to collect her and take her to her hotel.The taxi driver took the woman to her hotel and then apparently went with her up to her room. Sources close to the case say that the hotel receptionist saw the driver go up to the fourth floor and then come down some minutes later. It was during this period of time that the rape allegedly took place.
Once the driver had gone, the woman told a friend what had happened. The friend took the woman to the Costa del Sol Hospital for an examination. The results of the examination said that there were signs of sexual aggression involving penetration - which the woman says was against her will - and light bruising on her arms which could have been caused by being held down.
The hospital informed the National Police who arrested the taxi driver at a bus stop within a matter of hours. The driver was later released with charges by the courts.National Police officers have arrested a taxi driver who is accused of raping a foreign tourist in the Marbella hotel she was staying in.According to the sources close to the case, the victim originally intended to go home without bringing charges but she decided to do so and confirmed her version of events to the police.

Read More

Hicham Mandari lying face down in a garage between Mijas and Fuengirola on the Costa del Sol with a bullet in his head

Spanish police first came upon the body of Hicham Mandari lying face down in a garage between Mijas and Fuengirola on the Costa del Sol with a bullet in his head, they thought him just one more victim of a revenge attack among gangsters, typical of the region. Or they said they did. But the death of the young Moroccan has involved the secret services of four countries and turned a spotlight upon the secretive, sometimes menacing world of the Moroccan royal court.Mandari's body was found around midnight on 4 August, but it was not until 11 days later that police confirmed the death and ventured that the assassination by a single 9mm bullet shot upwards from the back of the neck bore the hallmark of a professional contract killing. The crime was "the work of common delinquents, very probably French or Moroccan acting under contract", police said. But under contract from whom? "We are becoming aware that the victim had created a long list of enemies," a source said with more than the usual circumlocutory caution in the days that followed.Witnesses said the victim, aged 33, was hunted down to the spot where he died by a person with Arab features. Some testified to having seen Mandari in the streets accompanied by three "Arabs or Maghrebis". Others swore they saw two men flee the scene to jump into a van driven by a third man."The only thing we know for sure," confided a baffled police source, "is that Mandari was killed the day he arrived in Spain. Effectively, he headed directly to his rendezvous with death."
He had already survived three assassination attempts - the last in Paris in April 2003 sent him to hospital with three bullets in his body. He came out stuffed with cortisone and with a serious injury to his right leg. More than a month after his death, no further leads have appeared, and the circumstances of his death have become more mysterious.Investigations have partially uncovered a tale of alleged currency forgery, blackmail and corruption surrounding the court of the late Moroccan king, Hassan II, where Mandari was once a trusted courtier.The tables turned brutally against the ertswhile golden boy of the Moroccan jetset, who went so far as to declare himself King Hassan II's lovechild, and whom the authorities in Rabat came to dismiss as a dangerous delinquent and fantasist. From favourite son to hunted pariah, Mandari went on the run while threatening to spill the beans on palace dramas involving concubines and secret treachery that would shatter the modern image today's Moroccan royals have been trying to project.

While Spanish authorities kept quiet over the identity of the body in the carpark, French secret services tracked down a Frenchman of Algerian origin who had provided Mandari with a false Italian driving licence in the name of Ben Al Asan Ala Laoui Icam. The man apparently saw Mandari just before he took the flight to Malaga on the afternoon of 4 August. "I'm going to Spain for a couple of days perhaps to Italy," Mandari told him over a coffee, and in an unprecedented gesture, gave his accomplice his address book and a mobile phone. Moroccan, Bahreini and Saudi security services have since become involved.Spain later complained that the French dragged their feet for five days before revealing the man's real name. Hopes of getting a lead from his notebook were dashed. "He did everything in code," police said.One story for the murder was that Madari had made a romantic tryst with a young woman with whom he was infatuated and on whom he lavished money. She is said to be a senior member of the Moroccan hierarchy who was on holiday in Marbella just down the coast. Another hypothesis, suggested by al-Jazeera television, was that Mandari was heading for the Spanish costa in pursuit of a business opportunity: he planned to acquire a local radio station to beam broadcasts in favour of Moroccan democracy to his compatriots across the Mediterranean.The Spanish newspaper El Pais indicated that Mandari had given the Moroccan authorities ample grounds to wish him out of the way: "It is logical to give priority to a suspected act of revenge of Moroccan origin, since Mandari constantly made threats against Rabat." But a French security source, quoted by the Paris-based Libération, was more circumspect: "Since we're dealing with an individual implicated in so many shady activities and who had so many enemies, it's necessary to look in all possible directions."

The scene was the perfect choice for such a crime. The Costa del Sol, hangout for rich gangsters from everywhere, has become so used anonymous contract killings that it became dubbed the Costa del Plomo - the Coast of Lead. Here, far from prying eyes, whether they be the forces of law and order or rival gangs, criminal networks mastermind lucrative drug, money-laundering and revenge deals.
Spain's sun-bleached, palm tree-lined, gangland paradise is not so far from the environment in which Mandari grew up and from which he was expelled when he turned against his powerful protectors in 1999.
"A future chronicler of Morocco's ruling dynasty should mark the name of Hicham Mandari as that of the man who pierced the thick walls of the royal palace and revealed the secrets of a monarchy of divine right made mortal by the human, too human, frailties of the reigning family," wrote Le Monde.
Brought up by his mother, Sheherazade Mandari, née Fechtali, the young Hicham grew up in the 1980s under the protection of Hafid Benhachem, a future national security director, whose two sons became his boyhood friends. Never short of money, the trio used to tear round Rabat on a moped and frequent the capital's smartest disco, the Jefferson.Hicham then eloped with Hayat Filali, the daughter of a senior royal official. The couple were caught, but instead of being punished, received the blessing of the king to marry. This happy outcome was arranged by Hayat's aunt, Farida Cherkaoui, the king's favourite concubine.She further arranged that Mandari join the court as a member of the security department, which was headed by Mohamed Mediouri, who happened to be in love with King Hassan's wife, who was known as "mother of the princes". (When the king died in 1999, Mediouri married her and they still live together in Versailles and Marakech.)Mandari lost no time in winning over the women of the harem by showing them with gifts. He brought telephones and computers for the king's concubines, who were kept in seclusion and attended by white-robed servants.By the late 1990s, King Hassan, though weakened with age, still terrorised his subjects through the arbitrary use of arrest, torture or secret prisons. But within the ochre-washed palace walls, he could not control the avarice among his own servants, who - fearful of their status after the king's death - plundered silverware, paintings, carpets and furniture.Mandari, through his accomplices in the harem and other courtiers, gained access to the palace strongbox, where he helped himself to several of the king's blank cheques. These he used to strip the king's accounts of several hundred million dollars, plus crown jewels and secret documents, including an inventory of royal possessions abroad - or at least that is what he intimated later, in a brazen attempt to blackmail the royal house.He was confronted one day by a court official who had been asked by a Luxembourg bank to authenticate the royal signature on a huge cheque. Warned by court spies of the king's wrath, Mandari fled abroad with his wife and their baby daughter."His majesty entrusted me with an inquiry into the thefts," King Hassan's Interior Minister, Driss Basri, told Le Monde. "I think Mandari had in his possession three or four state secrets." Mr Basri made this confession after falling out with Hassan's son Mohammed and fleeing to exile in Paris.Mandari left Paris for Brussels, Frankfurt and finally reached the US, where he launched accusations against the Moroccan crown. On 6 June, 1999, he took out an advertisement in The Washington Post addressed to the king, in which he declared he was "a victim of lies" and demanded "a royal pardon". He went on: "You must understand, Majesty, that for my defence and those close to me, I have prepared dossiers containing information ... damaging to your image throughout the world." A fortnight later, he narrowly escaped being kidnapped in Florida.King Hassan died in July 1999 and was succeeded by Mohammed, who sought to cover up the scandal and extradite the former courtier to Morocco. Mandari was arrested in the US in connection with the circulation of falsified Bahrein dinars to the value of €350m (£238m), fabricated in Argentina, and spent three years fighting his extradition. He was freed in 2002 and extradited to France, in a brokered deal under which France promised not to hand him over to Morocco.In 2003, his wife left him and returned home, whereupon Mandari prounced himself Hassan's love child by Farida Cherkaoui and hence brother to the reigning monarch. Ms Cherkaoui has subsequently gone to ground. At this point he was arrested on charges of blackmailing the president of the Morocco's Foreign Trade Bank, Othman Benjelloun, one of the richest men in Morocco. Freed on bail in January 2004, Mandari was now fearing for his life.Mandari planned to call a press conference in the glitzy pleasure resort of Marbella on the eve of his death, to lay bare "the blackest pages of corruption of the kingdom now ruled by Hassan's son Mohammed ... and call upon democratic forces to fight for a state of law", according to Madrid's La Razon newspaper.
Mandari's opposition movement, the National Council of Free Moroccans, was dismissed by the Moroccan weekly Le Journal in July, just days before his death, as "a still-born fraud composed of two fanatics". Moroccan authorities were none the less alarmed when he asked the well-known left-wing Spanish lawyer Cristine Almeida to help him obtain a resident's permit.Mandari told Le Journal in his last interview that he "planned a press campaign particularly damaging to Morocco". He also hinted at scandal in France: "I know all the French ministers," he said. "I know Chirac very well. I called [the Interior Minister] Dominique de Villepin but he has been told not to talk to me. I know lots of things about other politicians too."The dissident Moroccan writer Ali Lmrabet described Mandari as "the man who knew too much". He "gave the impression of knowing many people in the palace", and would show to anyone interested a photocopy of a Moroccan diplomatic passport in which he is described as "special adviser to Hassan II", Mr Lmrabet wrote in the Spanish El Mundo daily.Mandari was like an orchid, a friend recalled: "Beautiful to look at, but rooted in mud." Whoever crushed this exotic bloom, few in the Moroccan royal court will mourn his passing.

Read More

Police raids 60 prostitutes from Carambola, Canela, Manhatten and H2 roadside clubs

Eight club owners seized along with 60 prostitutes from the Carambola, Canela, Manhatten and H2 roadside clubs, all in El Ejido and Roquetas de Mar.largest network of traffickers of Russian women for means of sexual exploitation ever to have been investigated in Spain has brought the Spanish National Police to Almeria Province where the greatest number of arrests has been made.Operation ‘Zarpa’, which is in its third stage of development, has led to the arrests of 24 men and women in Almeria who have been controlling the illegal network. The Ministry for the Interior says a total of 400 women have now been arrested for being in Spain illegally as part of the operation, who were placed in flats which were tightly controlled and supervised. Eighteen properties in Almeria Province were raided by police, most of which were in El Ejido and the rest in Roquetas del Mar and Berja. The women were packed into small apartments, and police found as many as 14 beds in each flat.
More than two million euros have been sent back to Russia since 2006, and investigations have shown that the operation was controlled by married couples of both Spanish and Russian nationality. They will now face many years in prison.These exploiters lure girls to Spain with promises of a better life but once they arrive, their passports are taken away and they are subjected to a life of “sexual slavery”.

Read More

Ley de Costas has to be respected and chiringuito beach restaurants be removed from the sand

Mayor of Torremolinos, Pedro Fernández Montes, described the statements from Juan Carlos Martín Fragueiro, as a barbarity and a new attack on the Costa del Sol, while in Benalmádena the Mayor, Javier Carnero, said the law did not understand the idiosyncrasies of this type of business, even though no restaurants in Benalmádena would be affected.Ley de Costas has to be respected and chiringuito beach restaurants be removed from the sand, ten large municipalities on the Costa del Sol say they are having none of it.They say they simply do not have the space to relocated the beach restaurants and say the economic cost of moving them and the threat to workers jobs also has to be considered.There is a clause in the Ley de Costas which allows exceptions when, given the nature of the construction of the beach restaurant, it cannot be moved, and now the local ayuntamientos say they are to use that clause to defend the status quo.
Mayor of Fuengirola, Esperanza Oña, said the movement of the chinguitos would lead to the elimination of the Paseo Marítimos, and that would prove disastrous for the local economy.
In Marbella, where 98% of the beach restaurant licences have expired, the Councilor for the Environment, Antonio Espada, said they did not want to see the restaurants disappear from the sand.

Read More

Almuñecar has run out of money.Mayor set off on a trip to Morocco

Following the privatisation of its tax collection system, Almuñecar has run out of money.The Mayor, from the Convergencia Andaluza party, Juan Carlos Benavides, has warned municipal workers that this month’s wages are the last ones he can guarantee as the Town Hall is bankrupt.
Benavides blames the crisis on a lack of funding from the Junta and the Diputación, both, he said Socialist controlled. An ex Socialist himself, it was his decision to privatise the tax collection system, supported locally by the PP, which led to the current stalemate, with the Junta challenging the idea and the Granada courts which have meanwhile paralysing the operation.
The Diputación says that the Almuñecar Town Hall should have collected an income of some 3.4 million €, and they will help out, but the Mayor says he will not respond to ‘blackmail’.
After telling the municipal workers of their plight, El País reports the Mayor set off on a trip to Morocco.

Read More

Murder of a young Dominican in Madrid has helped galvanize that immigrant community.

23-year-old Luis Carlos Polanco Peralta died last Friday after being shot twice in the neck. Madrid police arrested the alleged shooter who is of Spanish decent who worked as a private security guard. The exact motive for the murder is unknown, though police said that the assailant confused Polanco Peralta with a drug dealer.
Several hundreds mourners held a silent vigil for Polanco Peralta and clamored for justice to be served. Among those who took part in it where his widow who is expecting their child to be born next month and his mother who said that he “never messed around with anybody.” Some even compared Polanco Peralta’s murder to that of Lucrecia Pérez- another Dominican immigrant who in 1992 was murdered in an ugly bias attack.Polanco Peralta was killed in an area of the Tetuán district lined with bars and frequented by Latin Americans migrants. The neighborhood itself has been the scene of tensions between the growing immigrant community and traditional residents. As one old-timer callously observed:“There are daily brawls among them. They do not respect anyone. All they want to do is boss around. Now they cry out for justice over the death of that boy. What more do they want if, for starters, the shooter has already been detained! ” grumbled an elderly resident walking down the street. –

Read More

Arrested four members of a gang found to be in possession of a substantial quantity of explosives

Police officers investigating a recent spate of robberies have arrested four members of a gang found to be in possession of a substantial quantity of explosives.
Searches carried out in properties in Torrevieja as part of a police operation, code-named, ‘Palmera’, have uncovered between 15 and 20 kilograms of Goma-2, a dynamite-type industrial high explosive manufactured in Spain for use chiefly in mining.Police are confident that the explosives were not destined to be used by terrorists. Although this kind of explosive has been previously used by ETA in terrorist attacks, police are satisfied that the four suspects have no links with terrorism, but are common criminals who planned to use the explosives to open bank safes and jewellers’ shops or in attacks on armoured security trucks.
Early evidence suggests that the gang, most of whom had previous police records, planned to sell some of the Goma-2 to other gangs and police investigators are now faced with the difficult task of identifying the source of the explosives, which may have been stolen from a local quarry. Alicante National Police said that they were able to positively identify members of the gang after coming across the explosives by chance, during the course of their investigations. Tomas Arenas, Security councillor for Torrevieja Town Council, stressed that such finds are rare and came as a surprise. Praising the National Police on the success of the operation, he appealed to residents to keep calm and assured them that the gang had not had the opportunity to use the explosives in the area.The four defendants, all Spanish (two men, aged 28 and 27 and two women, aged 24 and 23) have been remanded in custody.

Read More

Christine Baker did not realise that a casual visit to a neighbour’s house could result in the loss of a limb.

Christine Baker did not realise that a casual visit to a neighbour’s house could result in the loss of a limb. Tom and Christine Baker have lived in Javea, on the Costa Blanca, for 25 years but, in May 2004, Christine was the victim of a savage attack by their neighbour’s Spanish Mastiff dog. Christine, who had gone to her neighbour’s home to reclaim some frozen food from his freezer, had telephoned him in advance, asking him to lock away his dangerous dog, ‘Cuqui’. Her neighbour met her at the gates to his home and told her it was safe for her to enter. After a brief chat, she was about to leave when the dog appeared from nowhere and latched on to her right arm with such ferocity that she could do nothing to help herself. The neighbour, a Caribbean man aged 80, who had failed to secure the dog properly, could do little to help. After being mauled for approximately eight minutes, Christine managed to escape the animal’s clutches by poking the fingers of her left hand into its eyes. The neighbour, rather than help her, fled the scene and was later found in hiding by Guardia Civil officers investigating the incident.
According to Tom, the laws in Spain are very strict regarding the keeping of dogs, especially breeds like the mastiff which are listed as ‘dangerous’. All dogs must be micro-chipped and should have adequate insurance cover for any such incident. “Stupidly, this man (very wealthy in his own right) had no insurance on the dog, or even third-party liability on his own home,” says Tom. “He didn’t believe in ‘wasting’ money!” Dogs listed on the dangerous breed list must also be registered and licenced by the council. The process is a fairly elaborate and lengthy one (including psychological and physical tests on the owner - to ensure they are suitable - and criminal record checks).

The laws of Spain also state that the onus is on the witness to call for help. This he also failed to do and it was left for Christine to struggle her way home and dial the emergency services. “I must say they provided an excellent, rapid, service.” Tom says.

In the absence of insurance cover, the Bakers had no option but to sue their neighbour, who had been a friend of theirs for four years. Three years later, in February 2007, the case was finally heard at a Denia court. In the meantime, Tom says, “My wife had no choice, after two different opinions from hospitals in Denia and Valencia, but to have her arm completely amputated at the shoulder.”
At the age of 60, it has been very difficult for Christine to adjust from being a healthy, active and lively woman to depending totally on her husband, for whom she had previously cared after he suffered a stroke in 1999. The court awarded Christine 338,000 euros, plus costs (estimated at 120,000 euros) and interest. She had previously turned down a derisory offer of 155,000 euros as it would not cover the cost of her care for the years ahead. Their neighbour lost a subsequent appeal at the Alicante High Court.To date, Christine has not received a single euro in compensation. According to Tom, the neighbour disposed of all his assets in Spain (including his house), moved any money he had off-shore and declared himself insolvent.“So the next step is a criminal fraud case,” says Tom, “possibly to be heard in Alicante within the next five months, or failing that, in Benidorm in possibly another two years time!” “Can you imagine our financial status after all this time? It beggars belief, as we have been obliged to pay for everything – carers, drivers, solicitors’ costs etc.” He says, “Stress and anxiety have certainly taken their toll on us both.”The Bakers are yet to see the light at the end of the tunnel and, despite the horrific nature of the attack on Christine, have had to contend with long-winded legal procedures that do little to ease their suffering and much to protect the guilty. Tom ended his plea with, “This is not justice, even by Spanish standards.”

Read More

Kevin John Palmer Costa timeshare salesman disappeared

Kevin John Palmer is thought to have been murdered after he disappeared after a night out in a pub and country club in Hampshire – but nobody has ever been charged or convicted over his death. A murder inquiry was launched four years later when fresh evidence came to light that led detectives to believe Mr Palmer had met his death that night. Now ten years since he vanished, an inquest will be held to determine how he was killed – even though his body has never been recovered. The hearing, which will take place on Wednesday, will bring some closure to Mr Palmer’s family who have not been granted a death certificate, though they are sure he is dead. It was in the early hours of March 13, 1999, that Mr Palmer – nicknamed Jon Bon Jovi because he had similar hair to the rock star – was last seen alive, having returned to England that day from his Malaga home where he lived with his wife and child.He had spent a night at the Sir Joseph Paxton pub in Hunts Pond Road, Locks Heath, and the Abshot Country Club in Titchfield Common. Detectives know he caught a taxi from there with two other men and a woman, travelling to Bishop’s Waltham during the early hours. But a row broke out and the men are said to have got out of the vehicle, had a fight in Botley Road, near Burridge Social Club and the Horse and Jockey pub – and only two men got back in to continue the journey. They made their way to Hoe Road, to the home of convicted drug smuggler John Howett who also owned a second property in the Costa del Sol. In 2002 – three years after Mr Palmer vanished – Howett was jailed for his involvement in a drugs ring that saw £16m of cannabis smuggled into the country.
A year later, in October 2003, while Howett was serving his 12-year sentence in Parkhurst Prison on the Isle of Wight, detectives from the major crime department got a breakthrough. They spent the best part of a week digging up the garden of Howett’s former home in Hoe Road as they searched for clues to Mr Palmer’s disappearance. In particular they were looking for a suitcase, a driving licence and a chunky gold necklace. Neighbours watched as police moved into the small cul-de-sac and forensic teams began digging up the garden and removing items from the house, including carpets and interior doors. As they officially launched a murder inquiry days later, senior detectives said that they believed Mr Palmer had been taken to the house in Hoe Road, dead or alive. The inquiry also saw a team of officers fly to the Costa del Sol for six days as part of the investigation. Back home, all taxi drivers working in Fareham, Eastleigh and Winchester districts at that time were approached by officers who have to this day never been able to trace the man who collected Mr Palmer and his associates that night. A 51-year-old man was arrested on suspicion of murder and released on bail while files on the investigation, called Operation Arkholme, were passed to the Crown Prosecution Service. They later decided not to proceed with charges because of insufficient evidence. In deciding how Mr Palmer died, the coroner has the option of recording a verdict of unlawful killing or an open verdict. He is not allowed to apportion blame.

Read More

Police have arrested a 40-year-old Cuban doctor accused of stealing 126 morphine phials from the A&E department at Marbella’s Costa del Sol Hospital

Police have arrested a 40-year-old Cuban doctor accused of stealing 126 morphine phials from the A&E department at Marbella’s Costa del Sol Hospital, where he had worked as an intern since December 2008. An investigation was launched after police received information from hospital chiefs on March 2 that morphine phials had started going missing from hospital crash trolleys over a period of several shifts. During the enquiry officers established that the trolleys were equipped with all the basic equipment necessary for dealing with cardiac arrests and other emergencies. A crash trolley typically holds a defibrillator and intravenous medications, plus a variety of medical supplies. Access to crash trolleys is limited and their contents highly controlled. This should have allowed police to compile a short-list of suspects, narrowed down to medical staff who worked the shifts when the phials went missing. However, the hospital’s police report also indicated that the morphine phials had been taken by someone breaking the seals on the trolley and on the last few occasions forcing the lid of the trolley open. By cross-referencing the shift patterns of medical staff with the dates when the phials went missing, they managed to identify the culprit as a doctor who had worked there on a temporary basis and whose contract at the hospital had finished at the end of February. The suspect is not thought to have a criminal record.

Read More

Francis O'Brien, of C-Granada No. 3, Argon, 18132, Granada, Spain, pleaded guilty to the importation of drugs

Francis O'Brien, of C-Granada No. 3, Argon, 18132, Granada, Spain, pleaded guilty to the importation of drugs through Rosslare Port on June 27, 2008, for the purpose of selling or otherwise supplying.Garda Brian Cummins told the court that the defendant driving a Ford Box Van arrived on the Oscar Wilde Ferry from France. On the occasion he was accompanied in the vehicle by his son. When an inspection of the van was carried out cannabis resin to the amount of 79.861kgs was found which had a value of ¤559,027.The defendant, said Garda Cummins had put out a flyer in Spain for deliveries back to Ireland. He was contacted by a man, this person existed, but was in no way involved with drugs. This person agreed a figure of ¤400 to bring furniture back to Ireland.When arrested in Rosslare Port he was conveyed to Wexford Garda Station. He gave the name of a person in Dungarvan for the delivery but on investigation this person did not exist.Garda Cummins said the defendant is a married man with four children, now living in Spain. He was a native of Drogheda.
Mr. Michael Durack, S.C., told the court that the defendant had received a serious hand injury while working in the family Dry Cleaning business in Drogheda. He received some money, went to Spain to live with his family. His children are going to school in Spain. The van he was driving on the occasion was a battered old van he had received in lieu of payment for some job he carried out. He deeply regretted his involvement in this.Judge Doyle said drugs were the scurge of young people in Ireland. This is a very serious crime and she had no choice but to impose a custodial sentence.Judge Doyle sentenced the defendant to six years in prison, suspending the final three years for a period of three years. She ordered that the sentence be backdate to June 27, 2008.

Read More

Two Brits,are facing charges of attempted murder after shooting at police in Spain

Two Brits,are facing charges of attempted murder after shooting at police in Spain.Police say the men started shooting after officers asked them to stop urinating outside a shop in a Costa del Sol village.The officers survived only because the 9mm pistol used by one of the men jammed twice.The gunman, named by police only as Paul B, surrendered following a stand-off in Alhaurin el Grande, a hillside village 30 miles from Marbella on the Costa del Sol, a Guardia Civil spokesman confirmed last night.The second man, Paul Logan Donnelly, from Newcastle, fled after abandoning a six-inch knife. He was later arrested.Two civil guards, armed with pistols, had stopped the pair after spotting one of them urinating outside a video shop at 9pm on Monday. Paul B threw a passport belonging to another ex-pat to the ground then took out the gun.He aimed it at both officers, pulling the trigger twice, but each time it jammed, the spokesman confirmed.The officers then took out their guns and talked him round.A Guardia Civil officer described the incident yesterday. He said: “It was around the leisure zone and there were three individuals who were walking through the street and one of them was urinating in the middle of the street.“They (the police) went to identify him and the first of those arrested threw his passport.“When the police approached him then he took out a gun which he had hidden in his trousers, he loaded and shot at one of the policemen.“They (the police) identified him and arrested him without firing any shots. They are now in custody awaiting trial.”Meanwhile, a British Foreign and Commonwealth Office spokesman said: “The men were arrested for urinating in the street and possession of a gun.“A consular team is now working with the relevant authorities in Spain.“The investigation is at a very early stage.”

Read More

Junta de Andalucía will shortly be able order the demolition of any property it considers to be ‘manifestly illegal’ within a month

Junta de Andalucía will shortly be able order the demolition of any property it considers to be ‘manifestly illegal’ within a month, in other words any property which is never going to be accepted into an Urban Plan because it has been built on protected land, or on land of high ecological worth.
El País reports that the Regional Councillor for Housing and Territorial Planning, Juan Espadas, on Wednesday took advantage of an appearance in parliament to announce that his department is putting the finishing touches to a new town planning regulation which includes a procedure for summary demolition, without the matter having to go through any further courts. He said the legislation accepted many suggestions from both the Prosecutors and Ombudsman’s offices.
The measure, part of the LOUA, the Andalucian Building Ordination Law, is designed to stop building in nature parks or river beds from taking place in the first place, and end the current scenario that while such a case goes through the courts, other buildings are built nearby.During the debate in Sevilla, the P.P. Spokesperson, Esperanza Oña, hit out at the Socialists for ‘encouraging corruption’, while Espadas called for responsibility to avoid ‘social alarm’. He said that the Andalucian administration had done all it can to protect legal construction, and proof of that was that since 2005 it had ordered 17,649 actions in some 535 cases in the region, some 70% of the total, and mostly for building on rustic land.

Read More

Nine houses in Garrucha and Mojacar have been burgled, with the intruders amassing a haul worth thousands of euros in cash and home entertainment unit

Nine houses in Garrucha and Mojacar have been burgled, with the intruders amassing a haul worth thousands of euros in cash and home entertainment units.Five youths, aged between 14 and 16, who have been taken in for questioning, are thought to have stolen around 6,000 euros’ worth of audiovisual equipment, including home cinema equipment, LCD-screen televisions, Playstation 3 consoles and other multimedia items, which they sold on to a 53-year-old man, known as ‘Jeronimo’, who has also been arrested.Initial enquiries have suggested that he made the teenagers steal to order, so that he could sell the goods on to third parties. The teen gang took advantage of holiday homes being empty over the winter months in order to break in undisturbed. Police were able to round up the ‘Fagin-style’ gang after two of the minors were identified as the culprits in a burglary at a home in Mojacar.Investigating officers say that their modus operandi was very similar to that of other burglaries in the area.The teenagers are currently being held in a youth detention centre but, as they are under 18, if the case comes to court, any sentence they receive will be far more lenient than that which would normally be imposed on adults.

Read More

Stolen car gang thought to be behind the theft and alteration of top-of-the-range vehicles for re-sale has been broken up in Estepona.

Stolen car gang thought to be behind the theft and alteration of top-of-the-range vehicles for re-sale has been broken up in Estepona.They are said to have stolen the cars from dealers and garages and modified their chassis numbers, registration plates and other elements that could lead to their identification.These were then sold on in North African countries, having been shipped out from the port of Algeciras.The suspects, of Moroccan and Bulgarian nationality, often stole cars to order.One of their favoured methods was to go to a motor dealer and pretend they wanted to buy a car, so that they could see where the sales staff fetched the keys from. Other members of the group would then distract the salesperson whilst the car was stolen. The stolen cars were then taken to a villa in Estepona, where they were doctored for resale. The most recent arrests follow the detention of 12 other suspects in November 2008, thought to have been part of the same gang.Six people were taken into custody in Ciudad Rodrigo (Salamanca province) and another six in La Vila Joiosa and Teulada-Moraira (Alicante province).Also this week, 15 Spanish nationals were arrested in connection with a car-stealing operation on the Costa del Sol where luxury vehicles were stolen to order. Among those detained is a nightclub bouncer, who is said to have found customers for the gang. Documents and registration plates were forged and vehicles sold on around Spain and abroad. Vehicles valued at around one million euros, together with fake car ownership documents and the assets of eight companies, valued at 15 million euros, have been seized by police.The companies were found to have a further 500 cars, valued at around 10 million euros. Police enquiries are on-going and it is believed that, to date, more than 70 individual cases of theft have been traced back to the arrested parties.

Read More

British holidaymakers are deserting Spain in their droves latest figures show.

British holidaymakers are deserting Spain in their droves latest figures show. Spanish tourism bosses said 148,000 fewer Britons visited last month compared to January 2008 - a drop of 20.5 per cent. It is the lowest number since records began 15 years ago.
A source at the Ministry for Industry, Tourism and Commerce said: "British visitors are traditionally by far our largest market. "The fall is due to the worsening economic situation in the UK and the fall in the value of the pound. Britons are looking for cheaper holidays outside the Euro-zone." The southern region which includes the Costa del Sol, registered a massive 26.8 per cent drop in the number of January visitors from the UK. The Canary Islands, popular with Brits seeking winter sun, saw 47,000 fewer tourists from the UK, a fall of 17.5 per cent. The fall-off in British visitors is potentially devastating for Spain as 11 per cent of the economy depends on tourism. About 13.8 million Britons visited Spain in 2007.

The pound's poor rate of exchange against the euro means that British holidaymakers are staying in the UK or are heading for newer destinations.

Read More

Maras are much more dangerous than the Sicilian Mafia or the Camorra of Naples and they are coming to Spain

Violent gangs like the Latin Kings are almost inactive in Spain, but the country is becoming worried about the possible arrival of more dangerous gangs from Central America.The alert was given by Pedro Gallego, a Civil Guard sergeant who lived in Honduras for four years, during which time he analyzed what are known in the region as "maras," violent groups made up of young men and women ranging in age from 10 to 30 who only know how to survive via crime.The result of that study is contained in "La Mara al Desnudo" (The Mara Revealed), his new book He devoted part of the work to discussing two old Latino gangs that are well-known in Spain: the Latin Kings and the Ñetas, which exist above all in the regions of Catalonia, Valencia, Madrid and Murcia.Gallego said that both groups "are only in a dormant state" after the police substantially weakened them."They are resurging spurred by the loss of jobs and the crisis," he said, and the situation could become more complicated when the Central American gangs get into Spain, since they have tight relations with international organized crime."They (the maras) are much more dangerous than the Sicilian Mafia or the Camorra of Naples," he warned.He said that whether the gangs take root will depend on the entry of specific immigration flows from Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, the bastions of gangs such as Mara Salvatrucha and Mara 18.
Family reunification also plays a part: "There are parents who want to bring their children to Spain and some of them could be members of one of these gangs."In addition, immigrants who are already in Spain could join the gangs. "It's possible that they'll feel attracted to these gangs after suffering xenophobia and losing their jobs," Gallego said.The author warns that the gangs have a very rapid rate of expansion and therefore it is necessary to fight them as early as possible, with both social measures and support for families."When it's detected that a boy has joined (a gang) you have to guarantee him protection and help him get out because abandoning the group means death, in contrast to what happens in other gangs," Gallego said."They say that there are only three places where you can be a gangmember: jail, the hospital and the cemetery," the expert added.The bait for attracting a young person to a gang of this kind is an attraction to the lifestyle and its typical elements, the power status and the easy access to sex and drugs.
The members of the gang do not all come from broken families and many of them are even educated and have a good economic situation.Gallego in his book analyzes the possibility that the gangs may transform themselves into cultural associations, as happened in Catalonia in 2006."It was a very useful tool to halt the commission of criminal acts, but then it has not been studied how it evolved and it's certain that many gangs use the excuse of being associated (with it) to clean up their image without really having done so," he said.

Read More

Metrovaces Spain's biggest property firm said that it lost €738m last year, the biggest loss in its history, as the value of its holdings dived

Spain's biggest property firm said on Friday that it lost €738m last year, the biggest loss in its 90-year history, as the value of its holdings dived following the collapse of the real estate markets in Spain and the UK.The purchase of HSBC's tower in Canary Wharf - the biggest property deal in British history - has helped sink its Spanish buyer, Metrovacesa.Owners of the beleaguered building company, the Sanahuja family, will hand control of the company to its creditor banks, including Santander, swapping a 55% stake in exchange for cancelling €2.1bn (£1.9bn) of debt claims.The purchase of the 42-storey tower in London's Docklands is seen as the peak of the real estate boom for Spanish businesses, which saw a succession of firms launch themselves into an unprecedented debt-fuelled expansion spree. At the peak of the market, 800,000 homes a year were being built in Spain - more than France, Germany and Britain put together.The Madrid-based Metrovacesa bought the 100,000 sq metre tower in Canary Wharf for £1.09bn in May 2007, financed with a £810m loan that it could not pay off or refinance as credit markets tightened.

Like buyout firms such as Baugur, which have also found themselves in trouble, Metrovacesa counted on rising values and cheap debt. The recession, however, has seen valuations go into reverse, while the credit crunch has dried up funds.

The Spanish company sold the tower - 8 Canada Square - back to HSBC last December for £838m, leading to a £250m gain for HSBC and a loss for Metrovacesa.
The real estate collapse has exacerbated Spain's plunge into recession because the sector accounts, directly and indirectly, for about a quarter of the economy. Thousands of firms are going bust and even top football clubs such as Valencia can no longer afford to pay their star players.The former Valencia chairman and real estate entrepreneur Juan Soler raised the club's debt to more than €400m and started building a new stadium before it had sold the land occupied by its current Mestalla stadium, which it has still not managed to do because of plunging property prices and the credit crunch. Work on the new stadium has stalled while the club rushes to get a new financing deal with new lenders. A local savings bank, Bancaja, has already cut off credit.London's commercial property prices have fallen 27% since the credit crunch hit. The latest blow to Canary Wharf came late last month when Morgan Stanley quit its lease of six floors of office space 10 years earlier than planned.

Read More

Immigrants harassed by police who are allegedly under pressure to fulfill arrest quotas.

memo leaked to Spanish media this week is purported to have instructed one particular police station in the Madrid area — not in Lavapies — to arrest 30 undocumented immigrants per week.

Spain's sizable immigrant population already faces soaring unemployment in a souring economy and a government pushing jobless foreigners to go home. Now they complain they are also being harassed by police who are allegedly under pressure to fulfill arrest quotas.In Lavapies, one of Madrid's most multicultural neighborhoods, home to many North Africans, Latin Americans, Asians and people of other origins, immigrants say they are constantly asked for their papers to prove they are legal residents.
"Here, you will never see an immigrant without papers. They are afraid to go out on the street," said Abdel Kader, a 72-year-old Moroccan retiree who has lived in Spain for 40 years.Santo Aybar, a 33-year-old Dominican, said police "go to the subway station at seven in the morning and ask everybody for their papers."They ask to see my papers all day: at breakfast, at lunch and at dinner," Aybar said. "They treat us like trash, as if we were criminals."The Interior Ministry has denied there is any quota system. But police unions complain they are under pressure to make arrests, and say officers pushed to meet their targets have ended up simply stopping foreign-looking people at random at train stations and bus stops."Our officers want to crack down on crime, not on people trying to go to work," police union spokesman Alfredo Perdiguero said Tuesday.Such a tactic aimed at immigrants would reflect how drastically things have changed in Spain, and how quickly. Just two years ago, Spain's economy was on fire, and it relied heavily on immigrant labor in the all-important construction sector. Now the real estate bubble has burst, the economy is in a recessionary spiral and the jobless rate nationwide is 13.9 percent — and almost 22 percent among immigrants.The government has even launched a program offering jobless legal immigrants lump-sum payments of their unemployment benefits if they agree to go home for a few years until the economy recovers.Immigrants complain they are being made scapegoats for hard times after helping Spain create much wealth and become one of Europe's economic success stories.Spain's known immigrant population is nearly 5 million, about 11 percent of the total population.
Being in the country without a residency permit is not a crime but rather a misdemeanor. Those caught are arrested and fingerprinted and can be held for 24 hours. Then they are given an expulsion order but in many cases this is not acted on, Perdiguero said.Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba, addressing Parliament on Tuesday, denied there was any kind of written or verbal order mandating a quota for arrests of people without papers."The main goal of the ministry's expulsion policy is none other than to focus on those foreigners, legal or illegal, who commit crimes in Spain," the minister said.In Lavapies, not everyone is convinced of that assertion.
"There have been a lot of police around here in the past few months. But when the press reports what is happening, they leave us alone for a few days," said Ahmed Alimi, a 48-year-old Moroccan who has lived in Lavapies for 20 years.
Raul Jimenez, a spokesman for Ruminahui, an association for Ecuadorean immigrants, added: "It is clear that there has been a toughening of how immigrants are treated, because there is no other way to understand this."

Read More

Users of pre-paid cards will find their service suspended in November if they have not identified themselves

new advertising campaign ‘Identifícate’ is to be launched by the Spanish government Interior Ministry at the end of this month with the objective of getting the 20 million mobile phone users with prepaid cards to register before a deadline date of November 7.It’s part of legislation passed in October 2007 under which unidentified mobile phone users will be cut off, as operators will be legally obliged to deactivate the cards which remain unidentified. The legislation was passed as a consequence of the terrorist attacks on the trains in Madrid on March 11 2004, when such pre-paid phones were used to activate the bombs. It’s estimated that currently only a quarter of the current 20 million such clients are identified in Spain. Some phone operators are trying to speed up the process by sending SMS messages to their users, and there is concern that some of the new so-called ‘virtual’ operators have no sales points where clients can register in many parts of the country.

To register your pre-paid card mobile you are asked to go to a sales point of your phone operator, taking along a DNI or foreigners residency paper, while companies will have to show their fiscal identification card.

The cost of the entire operation, estimated at between 30 and 50 million € has to be met by the phone operators.

Read More

Search for the body of Marta del Castillo

Search for the body of Marta del Castillo, the 17 year old from Sevilla who went missing three weeks ago, and whose friend, 20 year old Miguel Carcaño D. has now confessed to her killing, has been extended downstream in the Guadalquivir River where Miguel said he threw the body, helped by his friend Samuel B.P.Police say the search has been extended as far as Sanlúcar de Barrameda 80kms away, and that it is being complicated by the 17 metre depth of the river and the fact that is tidal and there is a lot of mud. It could take days to find her body.Two helicopters are taking part in the search which will continue at first light on Monday.On Sunday hundreds of bikers collected in Sevilla to support Marta del Castillo’s family and calling for justice in the case.The two accused are to appear in court in Sevilla on Monday, with the main accused, Miguel Carcaño, possibly appearing in the Domestic Violence Court.

Read More

Cyril Jacquet shot his mother three times using his father's automatic pistol after she entered the family home.

Cyril Jacquet, 29, and his girlfriend were among the contestants on a new show to be aired on the Antena 3 channel on Sunday night. But the pair were pulled from the programme after rumours surfaced on the internet that he had murdered his parents when he was 15 years old.In 1994, Jacquet shot his mother three times using his father's automatic pistol after she entered the family home. A few hours later, Jacquet used the remaining seven bullets for his father.He was pictured smiling at their funeral and eventually confessed to the double killing claiming they had "scolded him" and "sometimes" hit him. After serving less than three years in a youth detention centre he was released with no criminal record under Spanish law because he was a minor at the time.
Organisers of the show La Vuelta al Mundo (Around the World) which follows young couples as they race around the globe competing with each other for a 200,000 euros (£180,000) prize, claim they had no knowledge of his past.But fans of the show did their own research and discovered the crime, which was well publicised at the time.
Jacquet and his girlfriend Paola Alberdi, 24, were flown home from Venice before the first show was aired."The programme did not know," a presenter told viewers on the show's debut on Sunday night. "After we checked the facts of the case we brought them back to Spain to protect them from media attention."Jacquet, now a flight attendant, was in the studio and blamed the media and "undesirable" people for preventing him from participating in the reality show."They don't let you leave the past behind," he complained. "I don't want to keep giving them the excuse to lynch me.""But I will always hold my head up high," he said. "People change."

Read More

Félix Martínez Touriño, has been shot dead in the street.

36 year old director of the Centro de Convenciones in Barcelona, Félix Martínez Touriño, has been shot dead in the street. His attacker shot him in the head in the San Gervasi area of the city yesterday and then made his escape on foot. Witnesses said the attacker was wearing a hat and scarf. Police are still to make an arrest and Los Mossos d’Esquadra say they are keeping all possibilities open in their investigations as to the motive for the killing.

Read More

Nationalisation of tens of thousands of seaside residences in an attempt to protect the coastline from pollution

Environment Ministry is backtracking on plans to nationalize tens of thousands of seaside residences in an attempt to protect the coastline from pollution, the daily El Pais reported Monday. The Environment Ministry had intended to step up the application of a 1988 law prohibiting the construction of housing near the water line. The owners of such houses, many of whom are British and German nationals, would have been granted the right to use them for up to 60 years without being allowed to sell them. Protests from house owners and the British and German embassies have prompted the government to soften the plans, El Pais said.
The owners of seaside residences are expected to be given permission to sell them, which will make it more difficult to nationalize them, according to the daily.
Environmentalists have long been concerned about the impact of urbanization on Spain's coastline

Read More

Iberia merger between the airline and British Airways was close.

chairman of Spain's Caja Madrid, the biggest shareholder in Iberia with 23%, said an agreement on a merger between the airline and British Airways was close.
"I believe the operation is close, that's my impression," Miguel Blesa told journalists as he presented the un- listed bank's 2008 results yesterday.Blesa is also deputy chairman of Iberia.When asked what was blocking a merger agreement, Blesa said the share split, corporate governance questions and the location of the combined group's headquarters all needed to be resolved."The perception now I think is that the share exchange will not be 60-40," he said of the likely stakes to be held by BA and Iberia. "Iberia is now worth more. It will be closer to 55-45."
British Airways' chief executive Willie Walsh is expected in Madrid today for talks with Iberia chairman Fernando Conte and other Oneworld alliance bosses.
"The talks are ongoing, no timescales have been set," a BA spokeswoman said.
When the two announced last July they were discussing a merger, British Airways expected to secure around 65% of the combined group, but since then its shares have plunged, worsened by a profit warning in January.Together with the pound's recent slide against the euro, Iberia's market capitalisation is now higher than BA's.
Iberia shares jumped 3.3% to 1.87 after the announcement. BA finished 4p down at 116p, partly because of massive travel disruption at Heathrow, its London hub.
BA cancelled all short-haul flights and long-haul journeys before 5pm because of heavy snow.A spokesman said the weather also disrupted other airlines, and the disruption was likely to continue today.

Read More

Spanish police arrested 13 people Tuesday on suspicion of links to organized crime and terrorism groups.

Spanish police arrested 13 people Tuesday on suspicion of links to organized crime and terrorism groups.A police statement said the detainees -- 11 Pakistanis, a Nigerian and an Indian -- are suspected of belonging to an international crime gang involved in passport forgery, drug trafficking and people-smuggling.Police said they were investigating whether the group may also have supplied forged documents to international terror groups. Spanish police often use that term to refer to Islamic extremist organizations, but a police official refused to say if that applied this time.Earlier, news reports citing police sources said 15 people had been arrested on suspicion of forging passports for use by al-Qaida members. Police in Madrid said they could not comment on that.Eleven of the arrests took place in Barcelona and two in the eastern city of Valencia. Police agents wore masks to conceal their identities.The statement said the group is suspected of having contacts in Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, Switzerland and Thailand.The group allegedly stole passports in Spain and forwarded them to Thailand, where they were altered before being sent back to crime gangs in Europe.In the operation, police seized numerous false and blank passports and material used for forging documents.Dozens of suspected radical Islamic militants have been arrested in Spain since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in New York and Washington, and again after the commuter train bombings in 2004 in Madrid.On Jan. 20, six Pakistanis were arrested in Barcelona on suspicion of tax fraud and diverting funds to Islamic terror groups. They were released days later for lack of evidence.

Read More

Italian Mafia in Spain

Italian Mafia in Spain. Twelve capos have been arrested in the past three months, forcing police to admit that the Camorra and N’drangheta from Calabria and the Sicilian Mafia are now a very real presence on the Iberian peninsula.Many come to Spain attracted by the opportunity to deal cocaine or to launder millions of euros through property. Others hope to escape the unwelcome attention of Italian investigators and Carabinieri by blending into the established Italian communities in Spain.A growing awareness among Spanish judicial authorities about the organised criminals has forced police to cooperate with their Italian counterparts.Among those arrested in Spain are Francesco Simeoli, Patrizio Bosti, Raffaele Laurenti, Mario Santafede, Marco Assegnati, and one of the Camorra “soldiers”, Paolo Pesce.General Gaetano Maruccia, the head of the Neapolitan Carabinieri, said: “There are many camorristas in Spain. Some deal in drugs, others are fugitives. They know the terrain, they invest in construction and have highly efficient companies which allow them to launder money from extortion and drugs.” Barcelona, with its large Italian population, has proved popular with Mafia bosses who want to disappear. Salvatore Zazo, 52, was arrested near La Sagrada Familia, Antoni GaudÍ’s unfinished Modernist church, earlier this month.Zazo was the boss of the Mazzarella clan within the Camorra and was wanted for trafficking cocaine between Colombia and Naples. Within the Camorra there are up to 80 clans; Zazo negotiated drug deals between three of them, authorities said.A source at the Catalan regional police told The Times: “These capos are coming to Barcelona because there is a large Italian population and they can disappear easily or they can operate more easily. It is also quite close to Italy – and the weather is quite nice, which is important.” Roberto Saviano, the Italian journalist behind the bestselling book and film Gomorrah, about the Neapolitan Mafia, said that Spain has long been regarded by the Camorra as a crucial part of its criminal empire.

Read More

more than a million flats for sale currently in Spain, forecast is they will take three years to sell at a 30% discount

Price of housing in Spain has to fall a further 30% for the market to adjust as needed, according to a study by the Confederation of Spanish Savings Banks, FUNCAS. The report defends the lack of credit coming from the banks, describing the closing of the tap as ‘absolutely rational’.The study showed that there are more than a million flats for sale currently across the country, and forecast they will take three years to sell.The study was presented by José García Montalvo, an economics professor at the Pompeu Fabra university in Barcelona, who said that prices had to fall a total of between 40% and 50% since the real estate bubble burst at the end of 2007 and start of 2008. Property prices so far had only fallen between 8% and 10% he said.He also claimed that there were many ‘sub-prime’ clients in Spain, and said he had seen credits awarded to people who had no credit record obtaining 100% mortgages with monthly payments of more than 40% of their income.

Read More

Antonio Caiazzo, 50, and Francesco Simeoli, 40, arrested in Spain

Antonio Caiazzo, 50, and Francesco Simeoli, 40, are believed to be heads of a clan in the Naples-area mafia, the Camorra, Naples police said in a statement.Caiazzo has been on the run since March 2007 after being sentenced to 12 years in prison by a Naples court.Simeoli, believed to be his deputy, has been a fugitive since June 2007, when an arrest warrant was issued for him for alleged links to the Camorra.
The arrest warrant also targeted Caiazzo and about 30 others believed to be affiliated with the Vomero clan.Spanish police said in a statement that the clan is known for “a brutal internal Camorra war that culminated in 1997 with the Aranella massacre, in which a woman died in the crossfire between two clans.”
Caiazzo’s clan escaped unscathed, becoming the “uncontested leader,” the statement said.Their capture comes after a series of arrests of suspected Camorra members in recent months in Spain, where the mafia has been accused of working with Colombian drug traffickers.“The Camorra and Colombian cartels work together in Spain” where the Naples mafia manages part of the cocaine trafficking, an Italian police official told the El Pais daily earlier this month — three days after the arrest in Barcelona of another Camorra leader, Salvatore Zazo.

Read More

Richard Keogh was gunned down by a hitman who lured him on to the street with a phone call.

Richard Keogh was gunned down by a hitman who lured him on to the street with a phone call.As the 30-year-old man left his bar rendezvous with a South American pal, a car stopped and a hitman emerged. He fired at Keogh, hitting him once in front of his girlfriend, before chasing after his target. He shot the Dubliner a further six times -- including twice in the head. The gunman was driven off in the stolen getaway car, which was recovered nearby with its keys in the ignition. A pair of gloves and a spent handgun magazine were also discovered in the car. All the materials are being examined. The car was found a kilometre away from the scene of the murder, at the Torrequebrada hotel and casino at Benalmadena, southern Spain. The Venezuelan man who had been drinking with Keogh in the minutes before his death was interviewed by police yesterday, but is not a suspect. He was held in custody after police discovered an arrest warrant existed for him in Venezuela. The garda liaison officer, based in Madrid, is now working with Spanish National Police to uncover any links between the murder and a previous attempt on Keogh's life in Ireland 14 months ago. Keogh survived after being struck in the arm, as he carried one of his children out the front door of his home on the Belfry estate in Duleek, Co Louth, in November 2007. He relocated to Spain with his partner and four children shortly afterwards. "Keogh knew he was under threat and that the gang who targeted him in Duleek were still out to get him. He had no major falling out with any Costa gangs we known about, so the Dublin connection is a strong line of investigation," said a source. Keogh came to garda attention as a major criminal around five years ago, when then gang boss Marlo Hyland used him as a bagman during drug dealing activities in north Dublin.

Read More

Arrests in the Body in the suitcase

25 year old man and a 40 year old woman have been arrested in connection with the death of a man whose body was found last Tuesday inside a suitcase which had been abandoned on waste ground in Benimaclet in Valencia.It seems the two arrested on Friday were romantically involved, and were arrested after the daughter of the woman alerted police to the fact that her boyfriend was missing. His description matched that of the man found in the suitcase. Police think that the arrested man could earlier have also have had a romantic involvement with the daughter. The mother had told her daughter, who is pregnant by the victim, that he had left the area on a business trip.The body in the half-open suitcase, which was found by chance, had six stab wounds and showed signs of torture. The victim and the two arrested are all from Honduras.

Read More

Juan Antonio Roca, the ex Municipal Real Estate assessor, has been sentenced

Juan Antonio Roca, the ex Municipal Real Estate assessor, has been sentenced in the fourth section of the Penal Hall of the National Court in Spain to six years ten months in prison. Roca was sentenced to five years in prison for the misuse of public funds, and an additional 22 months for document falsification.
He and two others charged in the Saqueo case also have to pay back 23 million to Marbella Town Hall.José Luis Sierra, the ex judicial advisor to the late Mayor, Jesús Gil, has to serve nine years in prison, seven for the misuse of public funds and two for document falsification.The accountant, Manuel Jorge Castel, has been given six years for the misuse of public funds and two for document falsification.
Another three accused were found not guilty. These are Eduardo Gonzálvez and Francisco Javier Herrera, who were employed by the two municipal companies, Planeamientos 2000, and Contratas 2000, and Purificación Notario, wife of the late manager of Contratas 2000.The case relates to the diversion of public funds into private companies from the Marbella Town Hall between 1991 and 1995. The sentencing has been announced by the magistrate, Juan Francisco Martel, who heard the case between October 10 and November 27 last year. He concluded that the three found guilty created a preconceived plan to divert the public money.

Read More

Female Striptease performance at Spanish jail angers guards

A prison guards' union says a female stripper performed at a Spanish jail and authorities did nothing to stop it.The union says the woman took her clothes off before male inmates Jan. 2 and committed several lewd acts at the prison in Picassent in the eastern Valencia region.An official with the Spanish Penitentiary System called it an inappropriate "musical performance" and said an investigation was trying to find out who authorized it.The union called ACAIP reported the event in a complaint filed Jan. 8 with the prison system and reported Thursday in Spanish media.The complaint says a female deputy warden witnessed the striptease in a recreation area and did not stop it. It says several female guards left the room in disgust.

Read More

Spain faced a "very high risk" of suffering another Islamist attack

Six people of Pakistani origin were arrested on suspicion of " fraud" Tuesday in Barcelona, northeastern Spain, Interior Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba said.Earlier in the day, a source close to the inquiry had said police detained 10 suspected Islamic extremists in raids in Barcelona, Madrid and the Canary Islands in an operation ordered by top antiterrorist judge Baltazar Garzon.Rubalcaba gave no further details as to possible charges, but a judicial source told AFP the six arrested in Barcelona are suspected of financing terrorist activities by carrying out thefts and sending money raised from criminal activities to Pakistan.The six had traveled to Barcelona from different parts of Spain, the source added.Spanish police have carried out several operations against suspected Islamic extremists since the bomb attacks on three packed commuter trains in Madrid on March 11, 2004 which killed 191 people in Europe's worst Islamic-linked terror attack.Islamic extremists claimed responsibility for the attack, which they said they had carried out in the name of al-Qaida in response to the presence of Spanish troops in Iraq at the time.
Police detained 15 suspected Islamic militants, mostly from Pakistan, in January 2008 in Barcelona who the authorities feared were plotting an attack in the city, which has a large population of Pakistani immigrants.Garzon has warned that Spain faced a "very high risk" of suffering another Islamist attack

Read More