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CRIME
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NEWS IN BRIEF Unkindest cut... SOME €16,000 will be spent on La Nucia’s 2021 annual cat sterilisation campaign with 50 volunteers seeking out feral cats for a veterinary visit.
Fresh cobbles THE second phase of repairing cobblestones around Javea’s ‘Historic Centre’ moved to Calle San Joaquin and Ronda Sur this week.
Poppy total A TOTAL of €85,983 was raised by the 2020 Poppy Appeal organised by the Spain North Branch of the Royal British Legion. The sum was just above half of the 2019 total due to pandemic restrictions.
Con job A GERMAN accused of a €3 million con has been arrested in Benidorm after hiding out in Spain for 17 years. He set up a bogus charity and kept all the money for himself.
Supermarket sweep POLICE have arrested a man who loitered in shopping centre car parks to steal from vehicles as shoppers stacked their purchases in the boot. The 36-year-old man stole from at least 11 cars around Alicante city. He would quietly open the front door and steal any items or wallets that had been temporarily placed on the seats while his victims loaded the boot. He had his car parked close by for a quick getaway and would immediately use any stolen bank cards before his victims cancelled them. Plain clothes police launched surveillance operations on several car parks and caught him red-handed. A GANG of 10 bikers was detained after more than 7,000 marijuana plants and 30 kilos of the drug were found in their homes. Police swooped on the drug traffickers - 10 men and three women of Latvian, Serbian and Dutch nationalities. In the searches carried out in Villajoyosa, La Nucia, Alfaz del Pi and Altea, 7,371 marijuana plants were seized, along
Wanted expat duo tracked to Valencia
March 11th - March 24th 2021
Big busts
ONE of Europe’s most wanted fugitives has been picked up in Valencia city centre. The Dutch crook - said to be Holland’s ‘most wanted’ - was arrested alongside a pal who had links to a terror group that once tried to assassinate the pope.
Dumb teen
Felon
The dangerous felon, whose initials were given as E.G.L., had been on the run after the fatal shooting of a man in an Amsterdam car park in 2019. Cops also nabbed another Dutchman of Turkish heritage who had links to the Grey Wolf terror group which
Bikers nabbed with 31 kilos of buds and five kilos of the chopped and vacuum-packed drug ready for sale. Police also found a drone, an electronic frequency jammer, a fake gun, €5,000 in cash, six motorcycles and seven cars. It’s believed the gang had been operating in Alican-
NICKED: the fugitive had been on the run since 2019 By Simon Wade
tried to kill Pope John Paul II in St Peter’s Square in Rome, in 1981. Spanish police working with te province for four years, with their only income derived from their illicit activities. The motorcycle group, known as Saturadah, whose Indonesian name (Satu Darah) means ‘the same blood’, was founded in the 1990s in Moodrecht (Holland). Since 2017, many of its members have been convicted in Holland of assaults, murder and illegal possession of weapons, among other crimes.
their Dutch counterparts also picked up Spain’s biggest-ever haul of ‘pink cocaine’ - 11 kilos of the narcotic - during the course of the operation. Other drugs including MDMA and heroin were found when cops moved in on the duo. The main suspect, aged 21, had disappeared from Holland after the Amsterdam shooting, only to be traced to Marbella when he appeared in a video clip of a wellknown Dutch rapper. But there the trail went cold until a tip-off led police to Valencia. He was in hiding with the second Dutchman who was wanted for his links to the far-right Turkish terrorist organisation. The Grey Wolf group has been implicated in several murders and runs criminal networks across Europe. Both men have been remanded in custody.
A 14-year-old boy has got himself into hot water after hijacking social media accounts belonging to two of his teachers. He posted messages that offered good grades in return for sex but the stunt backfired on him as a fellow student rumbled his identity through a simple ruse. The bad-taste prankster was arrested in an unnamed Valencia community town and charged with two counts of identity theft and the case is now in the hands of the Juvenile Prosecutor. The usurper contacted a female pupil to request videos and photos of a sexual nature in exchange for better grades. Unfortunately for the boy’s plans, the girl checked with the school to confirm that the sexual proposition did not come from the teachers and set a trap. She simply asked him for a video chat and when he promptly appeared, she identified him and reported his name to the authorities.