ISSUE NO. 1703
22 - 28 February 2018
A XARQUÍA - C OSTA T ROPICAL
YOUR PAPER, YOUR VOICE, YOUR OPINION
Photo credit; Policia Nacional
A bitter pill
WWW.EUROWEEKLYNEWS.COM
Jailed for bar attack A MAN has been sentenced to six years in prison for knocking his victim’s eye out with a single punch. The assailant will also have to pay his victim €56,988 in compensation after being convicted of aggravated assault following a fight at a bar in Torrox. Prosecutors demanded the defendant pay almost €56,000 for reconstructing the man’s eye and €1,000 in reparation on top of serving jail time. A further private prosecution is also seeking to increase any prison sentence to 10 years. The incident allegedly occurred outside a cocktail bar in Torrox Pueblo’s Calle Beso on May 10,
2015 at around 5am. Prosecutors say the accused approached his victim as he was chatting to two women before punching him in the head from behind, “without previous discussion or a word,” adding, “he gave him a strong punch in the eye from behind.” The man’s eyeball immediately came out of its socket and the defendant allegedly ran away. The victim’s eye required reconstructive surgery as well as stitches and took 54 days to heal. On 15 of those days the victim was unable to work as normal. Prosecutors say the alleged crime is further aggravated by the man being caught unawares.
No more water PILLS POPPED: Officers seized more than 400,000 of the illicit pills. The National Police busted an illegal medicine smuggling ring, seizing more than 400,000 pills and arresting 25 people, two of whom were reportedly from Motril. The gang are believed to have been based in Puerto Santa Maria in Cadiz, where they smuggled in black market pills from India to sell online. The pills were sold on websites that operated under the guise of being a legal pharmaceutical company, and sold all manner of products to treat conditions such as erectile dysfunction and weight loss, amongst others. The group were turning over a sizeable profit from their dodgy dealings as they were buying some of the pills for 10 cents each and selling them on for €10. In addition to seizing nearly half a million pills of more than 60 different varieties, the police also confiscated
€23,000 in cash, €65,000 in digital currency bitcoin and have blocked €320,000 in the bank account of one of those currently under investigation. Officers also shut down the web pages they were using to do business on. The organisation reportedly had more than 600 customers
across Spain and police believe they were about to expand their operations overseas as they had already established new deals in the UK. As well as the two suspects that were held in Motril, members of the group were also detained in
Barcelona, Sevilla, Madrid and Alicante, among other towns. The sale of this type of medicine is strictly regulated in Spain as drugs bought on the black market can produce numerous side effects which could be potentially dangerous.
EMASA will no longer supply water to the La Viñuela reservoir. The company, which has been sending drinking water to the dwindling reservoir for a month and a half, will instead now channel water to the Pinillo storage tank in Torremolinos. Viñuela’s water levels now sit at around 22 per cent with only 35 cubic hectometres remaining. Since early January, Emasa had been diverting around 100 litres of water a second to Viñuela in the hope of slowing the rate at which water levels decreased. The same amount of water will now be sent to Pinillo after its own supplies fell due to lack of rainfall.