
Eastern European gang disguised as Spanish cops drug and kidnap expat, demand €1.5 million


The unnamed Dutchman was taken on June 12 by a group disguised as Spanish police near his home in Lloret de Mar, a seaside resort in northeastern Spain.
He was released 11 days later after a police operation in Casarrubios del Monte, a small town close to Madrid where he was being held.
According to police, his kidnappers had been lying low near his home, waiting for the opportune moment to take him.
They hit him, blindfolded him and forced into a car boot at gunpoint, he told police after his release.
One of the kidnappers then used the man’s mobile phone to call his wife and demand a ransom of €1.5 million in exchange for his freedom, according to a police statement.
The hostage was constantly fed tranquilisers and sedatives by the alleged head of the gang, a Romanian man who studied medicine in Madrid.
Police tracked down the gang after the hostage’s family alerted the authorities.
They managed to rescue the hostage just hours before a scheduled meeting to hand over the ransom money at a hotel parking lot near a motorway.
Police said the kidnappers had begun moving the drugged hostage out of the house in a wheelchair before backtracking, realising they were being watched.
Latest from Crime & Law

Kebab shop owner didn’t pay vulnerable illegal migrants- including children- who worked for him in Spain
A KEBAB shop owner has been arrested by the Policia Nacional for allegedly exploiting illegal migrants. The 41-year-old man originally from Pakistan had a store

Man in Spain’s Malaga ‘beheads his mother with an axe after hearing voices’
A MALAGA man has been arrested for allegedly beheading his mother with an axe. The 46-year-old suspect was arrested by the Policia Local in the

Costa del Sol crime wave continues: Body found dumped in a ditch ‘tied up with signs of violence’ just 48 hours after British man shot
THE body of a handcuffed man was found in a ditch close to a farm in the Malaga town of Mijas on Wednesday, with obvious

Kinahan cartel bagman Johnny Morrissey spotted living the good life in Spain’s Marbella over the weekend while out on bail
NOTORIOUS Kinahan cartel associate Johnny ‘Cash’ Morrissey was seen enjoying a night out in Marbella over the Easter weekend. Long linked to cartel kingpin Daniel

Spanish influencer and friend of ‘the bad boy of Spain’s royal family’ is arrested in scheme to rob Mexican businessman at five-star hotel in Madrid
SOCIAL media influencer, Marta Hermoso, has been arrested with three others over a Madrid hotel robbery last September. Hermoso from Sevilla counts a number of