Torrevieja notary, 54 year old Juan José Martínez Román, was shot dead in his office on Monday. Police sources have said that the two thieves entered his office and demanded money at 1230 at the office in Calle Ramón Gallud. When he refused they shot him twice. Reports indicate that the made off with a quantity of money, yet to be established. Health professionals tried to revive the victim for some 45 minutes.It all happened while clients were waiting outside and other workers were busy in other offices.The attack is strange as generally business at the notary is carried out with cheques and not cash. The Guardia Civil have set up a special task force to try and find those responsible

trial starts this week of eight people accused in one of Spain’s largest ever hauls of heroin: 50 kilos of the drug which were brought into the country hidden in the tyres of a lorry seized on an industrial estate in Torrevieja.Officers swooped on the gang’s vehicle repair shop in June 2006 as they were cutting through the tyres with a saw to remove the heroin.The eight accused in the case are reported by Diario Información as ex soldiers from Eastern Europe and face a possible 96 years in prison between them. The state prosecutor has also asked for a fine of almost 2 million € - the amount the heroin would have brought the gang if it had been sold on the black market.

‘jamonero de Trevélez’, sentenced this May for defrauding 200 of his neighbours, has written to Ideal newspaper apologising for what he did. Antonio Herrera is behind bars in Albolote after the provincial court in Granada sentenced him to 11 years and five months in prison.He was finally arrested in the Dominican Republic in 2007 after fleeing Trevélez three years before with the money his neighbours had invested in his jamón serrano companies. He still maintains that the fled the country because he was being pursued by the ‘Russian mafia’.Herrera said in the letter to Ideal that the plea bargain reached ahead of the trial left him unable to publically apologise for his actions in court. . The jamonero says in his letter of apology that he is the only person guilty and regrets the situation his neighbours are now suffering, whose accounts for the past five years, he said, are now undergoing inspection by the Hacienda Tax Authority.Ideal notes that Herrera plans to spend his time in prison on writing and to studying law.

52 year old man, Manuel R.S., faces a trial by jury this Tuesday for the murder of Lamyae D., a 23 year old woman studying pharmacy at Granada University who was found brutally stabbed to death in her flat in March last year. She suffered more than 20 stab wounds and, according to evidence from the prosecutor, was dragged back into the flat to be stabbed again as she tried to make her escape after the initial assault.Her killer confessed to the crime, saying in his statement that he was drunk at the time and had ‘lost his head’. He faces a possible 12 years in prison and compensation of 300,000 €.The victim and her assailant were known to each other and, for that reason, the private accusation presented by the young woman’s family believes he should spend 20 years behind bars with the additional charge of ‘abuse of confidence’.

Tres muertos en un tiroteo junto al penal cántabro de El Dueso

Three people were killed in a shooting outside El Dueso prison in Santoña, Cantabria, when an as yet to be identified gunman pulled up in a car driven by another man and opened fire on their van parked outside the prison. They then sped away from the scene.It has been revealed that one of the victims, known as Tomasín, was serving a sentence for four killings, and the police believe the shooting was the result of a settling of scores. Tomasín, full name Tomás Ruiz Fernández, was returning to prison after a pass according to reports.There are a number of ETA inmates in El Dueso prison, but central government offices in Cantabria have ruled out any connection between Monday’s shooting and a terrorist attack.

Triple murder in a shooting outside a prison in Cantabria on Monday morning was followed just a few hours later by a fatal shooting in Granada province, where two brothers from Portugal lost their lives. It happened at lunchtime on the industrial estate in Ogíjares, near the provincial capital, when another man arrived at the restaurant where the brothers were eating.They began a violent argument and both brothers, A.R. and M.R., were killed in the shootout which followed. The other man, a Spaniard named as F.R.F. from Granada province, was also hurt but survived his wounds. He was arrested nearby still with the murder weapon in his possession.
The argument is believed to have started over a previous argument the men’s wives had had earlier that day.

Two Chinese prostitutes have been arrested for dumping a client’s body in a doorway in Alicante City after he suddenly died during a party at the underground brothel where they worked in the San Blas area of the city. El Mundo said the autopsy shows he died of a heart attack after taking Viagra and other substances at the party.
The man’s body was found in the street in the early hours of Sunday near the brothel on Calle Doctor Santaolalla run by a woman from Romania. The prostitutes and a man who helped them to dump the body there were arrested the following day.

Operation controlled by the Instruction Court Two in Torrevieja, a group of 19 people, 13 Albano Kosovo men, and six Romanian women, have been arrested in connection with a series of thefts from villas while their owners were asleep inside.
The arrests were carried out by more than 20 people from the specialist ECO unit of the Guardia Civil who say the group are implicated in non violent burglaries carried out mostly in Valencia province, but also in Castellón, Alicante and Tarragona. Often a luxury car would be taken.Investigations started more than a year ago, and the swoops which started at 6,30am on Tuesday morning saw several homes being searched in the Valencia region, one of them just 50 metres from the Guardia Civil barracks in Valencia.

suspected paedophile is on the run in Huelva after escaping from cells at the city’s provincial court. He is a 28 year old Belgian named as S.P.T.S. who was arrested on Sunday for alleged sexual abuse of his girlfriend’s young daughter.
It’s understood that both he and the girlfriend live locally.The man managed to escape custody on Monday by faking severe stomach pains, assaulting the National Police officer who accompanied him to the bathroom and eluding capture by the Civil Guard officers who were on guard duty at the doors to the court building.Europa Press said he had no money or documentation with him when he made his escape. As of Wednesday, police had as yet failed to find the fugitive.

British man faces charges in Alicante after trying to smuggle a large amount of cannabis on board a plane bound for Dublin. He was arrested at El Altet Airport last weekend after Civil Guard officers discovered in a routine control of the luggage which was to be loaded onto the plane that he had 27 kilos of cannabis resin hidden inside his two suitcases.He is named as a 27 year old with the initials V.B. and was arrested after the officers identified him as the owner of the suitcases in question. He now faces a drug trafficking charge from the courts.

Scotland Yard has opened an investigation into the death of Olga Pleguezuelos Puzueu. The 35 year old Spanish woman was married to the Briton, Mark Campbell, the information director of the ILD company which wants to build the largest casino complex in Europe, Gran Scala, in the Los Monegros desert in Aragón.A statement from the British police says they received an emergency call from a resident of a home in Harrow and found the body of the woman on their arrival at the scene. It had been stabbed several times.A 53 year old man was arrested at the scene, but his name has not yet been revealed, although it is known that he had injuries to his neck and one of his wrists, and has been admitted to hospital.The victim worked in marketing and had recently been promoted in the Aristocrat Europe company.

Eight of the 20 suspects arrested in the ‘Operación Poniente’ corruption case in El Ejido have now been remanded to custody by the investigating judge, including the Mayor, Juan Enciso, who Judge Montserrat Peña decided should be refused bail after five hours of questioning on Friday. The head of Instruction Court No. 2 in Almería City took the same decision for the municipal auditor, José Alemán.

The businessman, Juan Antonio Galán, considered the head of the Madrid branch of the corruption network, was the last to be questioned by the judge and was sent to prison on Saturday. The three joined José Amate, a former manager of the municipal services company, El Sur, which is believed to be at the centre of the corruption. Amate is the administrator of Arborimar and Maviroad, two companies which works inspectors discovered on an inspection last month were employing staff illegally.

His sons and two sons in law are also on remand, while Amate’s two daughters were granted 50,000 € bail by the judge. The Mayor’s wife and daughter were released with charges.The eighth suspect sent to prison in the case is the businessman Ambrosio Cuevas.
The corruption network is believed to have misappropriated through El Sur and a network of companies linked to the municipal services company more than 150 million € over a period of at least six years. The charges against the group following the raid on El Ejido Town Hall last Tuesday range from money laundering, misappropriation of public funds and document falsification, to bribery and influence peddling.

Elderly couple found in the ashes of a house fire in Villarubia on the outskirts of Córdoba on Friday, had been shot before the blaze broke out. Police say all the options, including domestic violence, remain open as more scientific tests are carried out.One of the family said that the couple had been together for ten years. The woman had three children from an earlier marriage, and the man is thought to have a similar number. A nephew lived with the couple, but was not at home at the time of the tragedy. He is said to be devastated.

Alicante leads the field for the number of vehicle thefts which take place in the province every day, surpassing even the capital, Madrid, in official figures from the Attorney General’s office for cases of this type which came to court last year.
Of the almost 80,000 cases in Spain last year, close to 13,900 of them were in Alicante. It’s an average of 38 vehicles every day and equates to one in every six vehicles stolen across the country.
Diario Información notes that, while vehicle theft in Spain as a whole rose by 5.4% last year, the result for Alicante was a massive increase of 39.2%. Manuel Martínez, from the AUGC Civil Guard association, told the newspaper that the province has become an important base for all types of criminal organisations over recent years, many of which are involved in the organised theft of vehicles.Many of the stolen cars are then usually stripped down to be sold on as spare parts. One noted case was in Almoradí, where a gang was broken up which had stolen an estimated 500 cars over the previous 5 years.

A Civil Guard officer called out to an accident at Las Pedrizas this April, then killed by another vehicle which skidded in the heavy rain, was remembered by his colleagues this Sunday, when his father was awarded a posthumous decoration on his behalf of his son.José Luis Blanca Lorca, who was based in Casabermeja, was 37 years old when he died and received a standing ovation in his memory at celebrations held at Civil Guard command in Málaga ahead of the Día del Pilar, the patron saint of the armed forces and of the Civil Guard.Diario Sur reports there were also some words at the ceremony for Juan Jesús Bueno Ortigoso, another Civil Guard officer who was injured while attending an accident on the roads of Málaga. He went into a coma after he was hit by a drunk driver on the road to Campillos last month, also while attending the scene of a previous accident.

Civil Guards are in hospital after their barracks in Los Montecillos, Dos Hermanas in Sevilla, was attacked by a crowd of local residents on Saturday night. The incident began when a group of youngsters started throwing stones onto the garage roof at the barracks and they and their colleagues came out into the street to try and put a stop to their actions.They were, however, forced to retreat back inside and call for reinforcements, as stones and other objects rained down from nearby balconies and windows. El País reports some 40 people were involved in the incident.
One of the Civil Guard suffered head injuries after being hit with a stick during the confrontation and the other was stabbed in the hand. It’s understood this last is due to undergo surgery for the stab wound on Tuesday.Los Montecillos is a conflictive area which is known to be used by drug dealers and where a similar assault on officers took place this April when they were attempting to arrest a local woman on a drugs charge.

Tax Authority has impounded a container at the port in Algeciras found to hold contraband weapons bound for Nigeria. The 30 weapons included 24 shotguns and six pistols, and were hidden in suitcases wrapped up in clothes behind cars which had been loaded onto the container.El Mundo said a large part of the ammunition which also found in the suitcases is of a type which is banned as illegal in Spain.
No arrests have as yet been reported in the case.

man charged with an axe attack in Órgiva two years ago pleaded guilty at his trial at the Granada provincial court this Tuesday, and has accepted a prison term of 3 years and 9 months for attempted murder. The victim, Francisco G.E., was attacked from behind with the weapon after an argument with his assailant’s father in a local bar, suffering a fracture in his skull.It happened in May 2007 after Francisco G.E. came to blows with his attacker’s father, José L.B., now deceased, during their argument in the bar. The father later told his son what had happened, and the two lured the other man into an alleyway, where the son, José Manuel M.S., attacked him with the axe and the father kicked him and beat him as he lay injured on the ground. Father and son then fled the scene.Europa Press notes that the court imposed a fine of 120 € on the victim for the injuries he himself caused during the fight.

El País printed details of links from the Gürtel corruption case to the Costa del Sol. One of the companies implicated in the affair, Teconsa, gave donations worth 318,000 € to Alhaurín el Grande, where the Mayor Juan Martín Serón spent the money on a library and the sponsorship of a basketball team. The paper says the money was paid via the Proinsa company, which planned to build 2,500 homes with swimming pools and golf course in the area known as Finca la Mota. Juan Martín Serón is currently released on 100,000 € bail and facing charges of perversion of the course of justice, bribery and money laundering. He said on Wednesday that Teconsa received nothing in exchange for their donations.The man at the centre of the Gürtel case, businessman Francisco Correa, is now also known to have purchased 16 plots of land and five apartments in Marbella between 2003 and 2008, despite, according to the case summary, not filling in any income tax return since 1999. He is the son in law of the late real estate promoter, Emilio Rodríguez Bugallo, who was indicted in the Malaya case. Correa paid his 500,000 € bail money, and the case summary says that to clear that debt Rodríguez Bugallo sold several properties in El Embrujo Playa to Correa as a way also of clearing himself of assets.

Britain's most wanted man has been arrested in Spain – after four years on the run.
Ronald Priestley, 69, from Colton, Leeds, masterminded a £4.25m banknote counterfeit fraud.He was sentenced to eight years in his absence four years ago.Priestley was arrested in Malaga. A world-wide hunt for him was launched when he failed to attend a Leeds Crown Court hearing in August 2005 to face charges of conspiracy to counterfeit £20 banknotes with a face value of £4.25m.He had disappeared from his luxury home in Colton. The house was protected by electric fences and guard dogs.
In their hunt for Priestley police urged Spain's expatriate British community on the Costa del Sol to help bring the pensioner, orginally from Bramley, to justice.
Priestley had a criminal past in counterfeiting long before 2005. In December 2002 he was stripped of more than £2.2m at Bradford Crown Court.Police raids on his home in Park Road, Colton, and factories near Huddersfield, had netted 138,000 bottles of fake fragrances and 1,500 bottles of Spanish sparkling wine relabelled as Moet et Chandon champagne.Officers also found £104,000 cash hidden in secret compartments at his home.In April that year he had been 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. Crimestoppers and the Serious Organised Crime Agency work closely with British Embassy and Spanish law enforcement agencies.Priestley was featured in the campaign's first 10 appeals in October 2006. He is the 25th out of 50 wanted individuals arrested in the past 10 days.

36 year old Briton, Richard Henry Roberts, has been sent to prison for 18 years for killing his compatriot, Daniel Hastelow in January 2008. The court in Palma de Mallorca heard how the accused had stabbed the sleeping victim eight times.
A second Briton arrested at the time, Paul A. Griffiths, was found not guilty and released without charge.The court and jury considered it proved that after an argument in a bar earlier the aggressor, Richard H Roberts, went to the apartment where the victim was sleeping under the effects of alcohol and drugs, broke in and stabbed the victim with a 20 cm long and 4cm wide knife eight times. The other Briton Paul Griffiths looked on.The two were arrested at the airport the following day.Richard Robert has also been ordered to pay 90,000 € compensation to the victim’s family. He has a previous record for violent theft, causing injury and robbery.jury on the holiday island of Majorca found Richard Henry Roberts, 36, guilty of the murder of nightclub bouncer Daniel Hastelow after a trial.But another Merseyside man, jointly accused of the killing in the popular resort of Palmanova in January last year, was acquitted by the jury of nine because of “lack of proof”.Roberts admitted stabbing the 26-year-old victim, from Walsall, seven times.
But he claimed it was self defence when the four-day trial began on Monday.
Yesterday, the jury rejected his claim he grabbed a knife from a table to defend himself when Mr Hastelow attacked him, delivering heavy blows.They convicted Roberts of murder, rejecting a defence plea for a manslaughter verdict.But the jury accepted the defence argument that evidence was not produced to support prosecution claims that Paul Anthony Griffiths, 23, also from Liverpool, took part in the deliberate killing of Mr Hastelow.It was alleged Griffiths beat the victim with a baseball bat as he lay sleeping in an apartment in the resort on the island’s south coast.Griffiths admitted being present when Mr Hastelow was killed, but denied taking any part in his death.The jury also dismissed a charge against both accused of breaking into the apartment where Mr Hastelow died.After the verdicts, Judge Eduardo Calderon formally acquitted Griffiths and dismissed him from the court.The state prosecutor then asked for an 18 year prison sentence for Roberts.He also asked Judge Calderon to order Roberts to pay compensation of 90,000 Euros – around £81,000 – to the victim’s family.The judge’s written sentence will be known later.

Brutal Marbella crime syndicate plotted to snatch and ransom the family of a top UK TV presenter. brutal crime syndicate plotted to snatch and ransom the family of a top TV presenter.Law agencies across Europe fear any celeb is at risk in the Spanish resorts where Britons flock for sunshine holidays.The player, who cannot be named for legal reasons, was targeted while visiting the area at the end of last year's football season. But the plan was aborted at the last minute.Ex-British intelligence agent Paul Grimshaw, now a security consultant in Marbella, said: "Crime gangs from Eastern Europe and Russian are moving in. The area is teeming with wealth."They don't care who they target as long as there is money to be earned. The footballer was picked out for that reason"They got cold feet. But reliable sources are adamant that a highprofile celebrity kidnapping is only a matter of time. Footballers, especially wealthy ones, should be vigilant at all times."Grimshaw revealed the threat of kidnap is scaring the wealthy away from Spain. He said: "Former England manager Steve McClaren sold his villa last year over fears about the rising crime rate. The Qatar royal family has not visited its 14-bedroom home in Marbella for nearly five years and will probably never return."A personal security officer for Spanish-based CCS24Gibraltar said: "I've worked on the Costa del Sol for ten years and crime has never been worse. It's dangerous and frightening. Kidnappings, drug-trafficking and robberies happen all the time."High walls and cameras don't deter these criminals. If they want to get you - they will."Leeds-born Grimshaw, 46, alerted the Football Association and the Professional Footballers' Association (PFA) to the soccer star plot. He wrote in August: "An England player was the target of a kidnap plot after the Champions League Final in Moscow in 2008. It is believed the player was pinpointed at either a training camp or during a vacation in southern Spain."Anybody travelling abroad should review their security arrangements. This threat was not limited to one player."Pfa chief executive Gordon Taylor said: "We can't afford not to take information like this seriously in this day and age.
"Liverpool's Steven Gerrard and Everton's Phil Jagielka were targeted by burglars. Spurs player Wilson Palacios' brother Edwin was kidnapped in Honduras in May. Wilson paid a £125,000 ransom but Edwin was murdered."There is precedent for snatching soccer stars. Manchester United ace Dimitar Berbatov was kidnapped in his native Bulgaria while an 18-year-old with CSKA Sofia. He was freed unharmed but recalled yesterday: "It was a horrific ordeal."Grimshaw, who has lived in Spain for 20 years, warned: "Abduction worries have rocketed, particularly in Marbella."The Russian Mafia has been gaining ground in Spain since the last property boom made it an attractive place to launder money. They prey on the rich - and will stop at nothing.In June, four Russians grabbed a man in the street in Estepona and told him he would die within 24 hours unless he paid them £12,000. He escaped after being tortured for two days. Some gangs are Kosovan Albanians, often ex-soldiers. Others are Romanian and Lithuanian.The family of property developer Frank Capa - a pal of Rod Stewart - paid a £1 million for his release after he was kidnapped in Marbella in 2004.
Ian Watmore of the FA confirmed they were reviewing player security after Grimshaw's tip. A security officer added: "Famous footballers and celebrities are sitting ducks. I advise them to choose their friends carefully."

Two gang members who are thought to have fled to Spain after raiding HSBC .As reported yesterday Patrick McDonagh and Carl Hargin were jailed for stealing more than £300,000 from the Westbourne Road branch in an armed, daylight robbery in June.
Hargin, 24, got eight years and eight months and McDonagh, 28, got seven years and four months after admitting the offence.Det Chf Insp McDermott, of West Yorkshire Police’s crime division, said: “They were obviously dangerous and very professional in the way they planned and prepared the offence, using stolen vehicles, one of which was later burned out and abandoned.“The level of violence used at the scene was horrific and it was lucky the bank staff were not seriously injured.“It’s a good result to have got the sentences they received.”Hargin, of Salford, and McDonagh, of Cheetham Hill in Manchester, were part of a four-strong gang who armed themselves with a sledgehammer, a machete and a crowbar when they targeted the bank on the afternoon of June 26.After forcing staff to open the safe, they fled in a Vauxhall Vectra with hold-alls full of cash.The car was later burned out and the gang got in a van, which was spotted by police.It sparked a dramatic chase from Huddersfield to Manchester city centre, where Greater Manchester Police caught up with them in the Arndale Shopping Centre car park.Det Chf Insp McDermott said one of the gang attempted to strip off his clothes and hide behind cars before he was caught.Hargin and McDonagh were arrested, but the others escaped.Det Chf Insp McDermott added: “It was a great team effort between West Yorkshire Police and Greater Manchester Police. They reacted quickly to information we gave to them and in difficult circumstances managed to safely arrest two violent offenders.”He confirmed the other two gang members were thought to have fled to Spain and added: “We have identified who the other two suspects are, and they have been circulated as wanted.“The case is still a live inquiry and we are still actively pursuing them.”