Harsh times are ahead with reduced services, manpower and increased taxes, but under Spanish law an ayuntamiento cannot go bust or be embargoed.

Local Town Halls are on the edge of financial collapse in Spain, and many are now planning sackings and increased taxes to survive.
Municipal debt across the country has reached some 35 billion €, with Madrid City Hall representing 7 billion of that alone. The Madrid debt has doubled in the last five years. El País names the La Rioja town of Ochánduri as the most indebted in Spain where it owes 9,810 € per person in the municipality.More than 30 municipalities owe more than 3,000 € per head.Many have been hard hit by the collapse in the building market, as 30% of their income on average used to come from construction.Harsh times are ahead with reduced services, manpower and increased taxes, but under Spanish law an ayuntamiento cannot go bust or be embargoed.

They've been called thieves, beggars, stinky romanian gypsies PART 2

They've been called thieves, beggars, and in the words of the Romanian president - "stinky gypsies." ... beggars stinky romanian gypsies

They've been called thieves, beggars, and in the words of the Romanian president - "stinky gypsies." ... beggars stinky romanian gypsies

Costa Crime

Costa Crime

Since 2004, more than 1,100 fugitives have been caught, most of them foreigners from Germany, the UK, South America and Eastern Europe

Since 2004, more than 1,100 fugitives have been caught, most of them foreigners from Germany, the UK, South America and Eastern Europe, and there are hundreds more cases waiting to be solved. Many of them choose Spain due to the quality of life and the climate. Between 15 and 20 per cent have been solved thanks to the help of the public, leading to the arrests of paedophiles, hired killers, fraudsters, thieves, drugs barons, pimps, Mafiosi, forgers, torturers, war criminals and a long list of others.

body of a 31-year-old Moroccan man was found in the Straits of Gibraltar

body of a 31-year-old Moroccan man was found in the Straits of Gibraltar, some 8.9 miles southeast of Tarifa, Cadiz. Sea Rescue in the town received a call from a ship heading for the Atlantic which had sighted a body floating in the water, and Algeciras Guardia Civil Sea Rescue team and the Salvamar Alkaid Sea Rescue vessel found and retrieved the body some 30 minutes later. The body, which was decomposing, was taken to Tarifa port where the death was certified by a judge and forensic doctor before it was taken to Los Pinos morgue in Algeciras for an autopsy. The man was carrying a work permit in the name of Nouredin Jounamane.

Maria Jose Carrascosa, a Valencia lawyer who was sentenced to 14 years in prison in the USA for taking her daughter out of the country

Maria Jose Carrascosa, a Valencia lawyer who was sentenced to 14 years in prison in the USA for taking her daughter out of the country, be set free. Maria Jose married Peter Innes in 1999, and their daughter Victoria was born the following year, however, in 2001, Maria Jose was classed as an abused woman, and in 2004, the couple separated and she returned to Spain with her daughter.

murderer of Sandra Palo, who was released in 2007,

murderer of Sandra Palo, who was released in 2007, continues his trajectory of crime ON the evening of May 17, 2003, 22-year-old Sandra Palo, who was mentally handicapped, was walking home with a friend, also handicapped, after they had missed the last bus home in Madrid. Fate led them to cross paths with four youths in a stolen car, one of them, Rafael Garcia Fernandez, known as Rafita, was just 14, he was in the back of the car, his cousin ‘Malaguita’ was driving, and two other minors, Ramon and Ramoncin were with them. They were looking for some action.

PASSENGER tried to force his way into the cockpit on a Thomson Airways flight

PASSENGER tried to force his way into the cockpit on a Thomson Airways flight from Cardiff to the Canary Islands. Staff and other passengers had to restrain the man, who was arrested at Las Palmas airport, Gran Canaria. A spokeswoman for the airport said the man, a Spaniard from the Canary Islands, was "nervous" and "panicked" during the flight. He was later freed by police.

PAOLO DI MAURO, the 58-year-old head of the Camorra’s Contini clan who was arrested in Casteldelfells (Barcelona)

PAOLO DI MAURO, the 58-year-old head of the Camorra’s Contini clan who was arrested in Casteldelfells (Barcelona) on January 26 after seven years on the run, was the country’s third most wanted man said the Italy’s Interior ministry. Arrested at the same time was 50-year-old Luigi Mocerino, who headed the clan’s international drugs network.

house market crash has seen the value of homes on the Costa del Sol crash to below 65 per cent their original asking price

one million Britons living in Spain some 74 per cent revealed that repatriation is now a distinct possibility, according to a study undertaken by Moneycorp.Some 37 per cent of those surveyed admitted that they were already looking into returning to the British Isles.The house market crash has seen the value of homes on the Costa del Sol crash to below 65 per cent their original asking price.“Brits living in Spain are particularly affected by the struggling property market with many owning holiday homes and letting out their Spanish properties.”
Add the plummeting pound and limited job opportunities, the survey has fuelled fears that there could be a widespread exodus.“Brits living in Europe are feeling the effects of the weak pound as they are more likely to be reliant on income from their British property, UK pension and other regular sources of funds,” said David Kerns, Head of Private Clients at Moneycorp.“Brits living in Spain are particularly affected by the struggling property market with many owning holiday homes and letting out their Spanish properties.”Meanwhile, the survey also revealed that more than a third of expatriates in Italy, Germany and France are also mulling over moving back to the UK.Kerns added: “Our research shows that British expats have had a tough time and the findings reveal that no country has escaped unharmed from the economic downturn.”The survey interviewed 250 Europe-based UK expatriates and was conducted from October to November 2009.

Frankie Weber in prison on the Costa del Sol last night accused of three attempted murders.

Frankie Weber was in prison on the Costa del Sol last night accused of three attempted murders.Frankie Weber, 25, from London, is alleged to have fled to Gibraltar after stabbing three Spaniards in a street fight in Marbella.
He was returned to Spain where he now faces trial. Spanish police said the wounded were only saved by swift action by medics.25 year old Martial Arts expert is wanted in connection with the stabbing of three people in a street fight in Marbella
A British man has been extradited from Gibraltar to Spain to face charges of three attempted homicides.The 25 year old is accused of trying to carry out the homicides in Marbella, and the extradition comes as a result of a request made by Instruction Court Two in the town. The court has now ordered the suspect to be held in prison on remand.The case dates back to the early hours of January 24 this year when Spanish National Police were called to a fight in the Plaza de los Olivos in Marbella, which resulted in one very serious stabbing and two more suffering serious stab wounds. The most seriously hurt has had to undergo several surgeries. Police found many large knives at the suspect’s home and established that he had fled to Gibraltar. The agents from the UDEV Specialist Violent Crime Unit describe the suspect, who is an expert in martial arts, as ‘very dangerous’. They say a 30cm long machete was found in a nearby rubbish bin shortly after the aggression, which they believe he dumped during his escape.

new wave of illegal immigrants in Almería

new wave of illegal immigrants in Almería, where 48 migrants were arrested in less than 24 hours. The first five were arrested after reaching shore near the marina in Aguadulce at around 9.30 on Tuesday morning, and a boat with another six passengers on board was intercepted by the Civil Guard 10 miles south of Cabo de Gata less than two hours later. Europa Press said one of the occupants was a woman.The third patera was detected by the SIVE electronic surveillance system off Los Baños beach, in Almerimar, on Tuesday afternoon. There were 36 men from Sub Saharan Africa on board the vessel.In western Andalucía, three juvenile migrants, with ages ranging from 11 to 14, were discovered hiding beneath a lorry at the port in Algeciras early on Wednesday. They are reported to be in good health despite their experience.

Ronald Priestley, who was one of Britain's most wanted men, fled to Spain's "Costa del Crime"

Ronald Priestley, who was one of Britain's most wanted men, fled to Spain's "Costa del Crime" in 2005 after masterminding the £4.25million fake banknote fraud.The 69-year-old was sentenced to eight years in jail in his absence but was eventually arrested by Spanish police in Marbella.At Leeds Crown Court on Friday, Judge Peter Collier told Priestley: "Your sentence commences today." In 2006 a jury heard that after a surveillance operation on Priestley and his associates, a sophisticated printing operation which could turn out counterfeit £20 notes was uncovered in Birmingham.Priestley, of Leeds, West Yorks, will also face the judge of his original trial, Judge Geoffrey Marson QC, over charges relating to breach of bail.Michael Smith, representing him, asked for the case to be adjourned.Priestley had been previously jailed in April 2002 for conspiring to sell counterfeit perfume and champagne.

Málaga province forced Chinese women into prostitution

Three people who forced Chinese women into prostitution, holding them for 24 hours a day in a property in Santa Pola which was used as the brothel, have been taken into custody by National Police. One woman who was found in the flat was freed by the officers who raided the property, which had been under surveillance for some time before police decided to make their move.The Interior Ministry said in a statement this week that the victims were ‘recruited’ through job offers on a web page, but then found themselves kept captive by their bosses, who also withheld their passports. The money they earned was paid into bank accounts opened in the women’s names – between 120 and 600 € a day - half of which was then transferred the following morning to a bank in China.Bank documents, computers and bank notes were seized during the search.The investigation began in March in Málaga province, leading detectives to the leaders of the organisation based in Santa Pola.

British man, wanted in connection with causing the death of another driver

British man, wanted in connection with causing the death of another driver when he was drunk and driving against the traffic last June, has been arrested by the National Police in Alicante Airport. The arrest came as part of a joint operation with the SOCA, British Serious Organised Crime Agency. Named as P.L. he was born in Glasgow in 1981 and had been driving a van against the traffic on the motorway at Larkhall in Scotland when the accident happened, despite him being banned from driving at the time.

Arrested two Britons and Irishman in connection with the theft of top of the range cars in the U.K.

National Police in Orihuela Costa, Alicante have arrested two Britons and Irishman in connection with the theft of top of the range cars in the U.K. which were then brought to Spain to be sold illegally, or to be used in the carrying out of other crimes.The first arrest came when one of those detained was driving a Mercedes ML 270 on false British plates, and checks established it had been stolen in the U.K. After he was arrested the other members of the group were identified and also detained when driving a stolen Audi A4 on false British plates.Two vehicles with false number plates were recovered in the operation, along with fake driving licences and I.D.Those arrested have been named as 28 year old L.S., 33 year old E.D.D. and 28year old A.L.S.

77 year old Sheila Peterkin, originally from Portsoy, Aberdeenshire, and her husband, Jorge Pérez, a former philosophy professor, were found stabbed t

The couple's bodies being removed from the scene of the murder - EFE
Sheila Peterkin and her husband, Jorge Pérez, were stabbed to death by their mentally ill sonThe Glasgow Sunday Mail has revealed that the woman who, with her husband, was killed by her schizophrenic son at her Madrid home last weekend, was a Scottish woman who had moved to Spain in the 1950s.77 year old Sheila Peterkin, originally from Portsoy, Aberdeenshire, and her husband, Jorge Pérez, a former philosophy professor, were found stabbed to death at their home on Calle Fermín Caballero, in the Fuencarral district of the city, on Sunday 11th October. Their 47 year old son, Andrés Pérez Peterkin, still holding the murder weapon, admitted his guilt when officers arrived at the scene, and was taken to hospital after trying to take his life with the same knife he had used on his parents.His brother Miguel criticised in a letter published last week that the closure of psychiatric institutions has left many of the mentally ill out on the streets without the care and treatment that they need. ‘Schizophrenia’, he said, has caused my dear brother to commit an act that has filled his conscience with pain, remorse and guilt.’The newspaper said Andrés was diagnosed with schizophrenia at the age of 16.

Whiskeria murder in Marbella

fatal stabbing of a young Romanian woman in Marbella on Friday night is under investigation by police as a domestic violence murder, following the arrest of the victim’s ex boyfriend in connection with her death. Also from Romania, the 30 year old is reported by Diario Sur to have been in a relationship with the victim for a number of years.The 26 year old woman died outside a well-known alternative nightclub on the N-340 road between Puerto Banús and Puente Romano at around 11.30 on Friday night, where her suspected assailant was waiting for her as she arrived. She is understood to have been stabbed at least 10 times, despite efforts by staff at the club to stop the fatal attack after the victim’s friend, who had arrived there with her, ran inside for help.Police found the murder weapon lying on the ground beside her body when they arrived at the scene, and her assailant crouching down beside her. Emergency services were unable to do anything to save her life.
The man was refused bail by the duty judge in Marbella.

Would-be bank robber who waited patiently in line for more than 10 minutes for his turn at the cash desk

Would-be bank robber who waited patiently in line for more than 10 minutes for his turn at the cash desk last Friday was overpowered by other customers queuing up at the branch in Málaga City, Diario Sur reports.His attire in the recent warm weather had already given some cause for suspicion: a cap with a visor pulled down to cover the upper part of his face, and a high-necked pullover covering part of his chin. Suspicions were confirmed when he responded to the cashier’s question of ‘How may I help you?’ with the reply, ‘I’ve come to rob the bank’, pulling out a large knife from his pocket.Customers in the queue managed to force him to the ground and hold him there until police arrived on the scene. He turned out to be a regular client of the branch and is noted by Sur to be under treatment for psychiatric problems.

“Malaya” case which revolved around corruption in the building developments ,mainly in Marbella on the Costa del Sol

“Malaya” case which revolved around corruption in the building developments ,mainly in Marbella on the Costa del Sol is now estimated to have involved the enormous figure of 670 million euros in money laundering deals.Most of this involves money received in exchange for “favours”in relation to building development in the city of Marbella. The money laundering is thought to have involved up to 27 people.These people it appears were under the control of a single ringleader.This was the former town planning assessor Juan Antonio Roca.The suspects are spread right across Spain and include six lawyers from a firm in Madrid.As well as the property corruption scandal on the Costa del Sol,particularly in and around Marbella ,it is also thought that the area known as Los Alcazares in Murcia is also involved .

300 million pounds that police estimate boiler rooms will steal from U.K. investors this year

300 million pounds that police estimate boiler rooms will steal from U.K. investors this year compared with 100 million pounds in 2007. They say cold- calling share sellers are finding it easier to lure victims as people look for quicker returns in the wake of the financial crisis.Spain is the friendliest locale for boiler rooms that target U.K. investors, investigators say. Its major cities are only a two-hour flight from London, and the country is home to 761,000 expatriate Britons, according to the U.K. Foreign Office, making it an ideal place to set up a stock-selling operation aimed at English speakers. About one-third of all known boiler rooms are located in Spain, according to data from the U.K. Financial Services Authority.
That’s why British tabloid newspapers refer to the 1,000- mile stretch of Mediterranean coastline -- which runs from Barcelona in the northeast to the resort of Marbella in the south -- as the “Costa del Crime.”

Spain’s beach communities gained notoriety as a safe haven for British criminals in the early 1980s, when convicted robber Ronnie Knight spent a decade there on the run. A century-old extradition agreement between the U.K. and Spain lapsed in 1978 amid tensions over the status of Gibraltar, the self-governing British territory that Spain claims as its own. While the agreement was re-established in 1985 just before Spain joined the European Community, the predecessor to the European Union, the country didn’t shake off its image as a gangster refuge.

“What do boiler rooms want?” asks Michael Levi, a professor of criminology at the University of Cardiff in Wales, who has written books on corporate crime. “They want a nice environment, and that means good telecoms and a local police and judiciary that aren’t too bothered about them. That has been true for Spain.”
Small investors aren’t the only victims of the con artists. ValiRx, which is listed on London’s Alternative Investment Market, says its legitimate business and good name have been damaged by the Damak scam. “Cases like this have a very negative impact,” says ValiRx Finance Director George Morris. He traces problems back to Pacific Continental Securities (U.K.) Ltd., a legal London- based brokerage that the FSA liquidated in 2008, after the regulator found that Pacific Continental had shared client information with boiler rooms. The gang that targeted Reay was behind several share scam operations, including Blackwell Advisory Group, run from one of Barcelona’s most exclusive neighborhoods. Blackwell’s office was on the first floor of an apartment block with ceramic mosaics and wrought-iron balconies along the city’s Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes, near boutiques for Gucci Group NV and Giorgio Armani SpA. The firm was run by Danish-born Henrik Botcher, now 37. Fraser Jenkins, a 28-year-old Welshman, assisted Botcher by supervising the Blackwell Web site, showcasing information and live share prices about the companies being flogged by its salesmen. “He’s been to university; he’s a bright lad, and polite,” says Martin Hall, detective constable at the City of London police, about Jenkins. “I’m sure you wouldn’t mind taking him home to meet your mum.” The portrait of the Blackwell operation conveyed by court documents, police investigations and witness accounts shows a competitive, male-dominated world reminiscent of a David Mamet play. A team of 15 young men, who had answered advertisements in London newspapers seeking “telesales terrorists,” made several hundred calls each day. None of the workers knew the surnames of their two bosses, according to witness statements gathered by police. Henrik and Fraser paid salaries in cash and billeted the cold-callers in an apartment above a shuttered hairdresser’s shop. Such communal living is typical of boiler room operations because it increases competition among employees. Callers pulled down 4,000 pounds a month plus commissions-operating in a cutthroat world where a Rolex watch would be dangled off a hook on the office wall as a sales incentive. At night, the boiler room boys enjoyed a culture of heavy drinking and drug use, according to witness statements. The men frequently could be spotted outside, smoking furiously to relieve stress, says Juan Carlos Miguel, a barman at the cafe next door to Blackwell’s offices. “Then, from one day to the next, they were gone.” Spain’s national stock market regulator, the Comision Nacional del Mercado de Valores, had jurisdiction over only licensed brokerage firms until 2007. By the time it was granted legal powers to go after share fraud, a culture of crime had taken root, says Maria Gracia Rubio, a Madrid-based securities lawyer at Baker & McKenzie. “The law takes some time to permeate through society,” Gracia Rubio says. A spokeswoman for the CNMV declined repeated requests to comment.
The Damak scam that stole Reay’s nest egg was masterminded by Claude Clifford Greaves, 52, a London-based tax adviser partial to wearing silk handkerchiefs in his suit pockets. Police say Greaves is a serial trickster responsible for at least 10 million pounds worth of fraud over five years. His financial web was spun from the U.K. and Spain to the Caribbean, Paraguay and Hong Kong. Greaves has traded in his bespoke clothes for the maroon sweater and green pants inmates are required to wear at a minimum-security prison on England’s southern coast, where he’s serving a sentence of five and a half years. He was found guilty by a London jury in March on charges of money laundering and selling financial products without authorization. Three other defendants were sentenced to a total of eight years and three months after pleading guilty to their part in the scheme that relieved the Reay family of its money. Boiler room criminals use technology and creativity to obscure their true locations. Overseas-based salesmen route calls through London dialing codes and direct investors to send checks to fancy addresses in the U.K. capital-where the companies maintain post office boxes. The men who make the calls are typically well-spoken: Police say recruitment is being stepped up on university campuses in England to attract students hungry for jobs. The callers often mesh two first names as a pseudonym, as Robert Samuel did. His real identity was never discovered.
British investors are particularly vulnerable to cold calls because names of shareholders in each publicly traded company must be listed in registers. Addresses and the number of shares they own are also included. Those registries make it easy for smooth-talking sales agents to broaden their base of victims, says Bob Wishart, a detective superintendent at the City of London Police who heads Operation Archway, a task force dedicated to shutting down boiler rooms.

“We had the Cambridge University professor, a member of the House of Lords -- we’ve had them all,” Wishart says. So-called suckers’ lists of investor telephone numbers are passed around boiler rooms, authorities say. Britain’s FSA last November wrote to warn 11,500 people that they were on a list obtained by regulatory counterparts in Canada. “Because we recognize that getting the funds back is so difficult, we focus our resources on trying to warn off members of the public from dealing with the share fraudsters in the first place,” says Jason Burt, an official at the U.K. regulator’s unauthorized business division. Before her first foray in the stock market, Reay had already dabbled, unsuccessfully, in other investments. She had lost money in land bank deals, where companies bundle undeveloped plots, organize development permission for the properties and flip them for a higher price. She believes those investments first put her name into play.

Reay became suspicious about the fate of her money around Christmas 2006, when she still hadn’t received ValiRx share certificates. She looked up Damak Group on an Internet search and found a police notice urging people to come forward if they believed they had been scammed. She was just one of thousands of victims targeted by various scams run by Greaves, who at the time was serving a three-year jail sentence in London at Her Majesty’s Prison, Wandsworth, for an unrelated 7.5 million pound fraud. He had been convicted of avoiding value-added tax payable on computer parts across the European Union in what’s known as a carousel fraud. By the end of 2006, Greaves was managing a network of about 30 people in three different countries while on day release from his first jail sentence. “Claude could talk and talk and talk,” says Hall, who led Operation Storm, the effort that brought down Damak. “He’s quite funny in a way. He’s nice enough to talk to. You wouldn’t want to invest your money with him but … .” Born in Grenada in 1957, Greaves grew up in Peckham, a gritty part of south London. By the time of his arrest in 2008, Greaves was living in London’s exclusive Mayfair district, a short walk from Buckingham Palace. He qualified as a tax adviser with the U.K. Chartered Institute of Taxation in 1980, records show, and set up an accounting firm soon after. He eventually established a Mayfair tax advisory business, ROK International Ltd., in March 2004. It’s one of at least 60 companies in which Greaves has been listed as a director, according to U.K. corporate records. ROK International was located in a whitewashed Bruton Street townhouse that faces The Square, a Michelin-starred restaurant, and is around the corner from the jewelry stores and boutiques of Bond Street. His son and daughter, Leigh and Phillipa, both in their 20s, managed ROK during their father’s first stay at Her Majesty’s pleasure.

Leigh Greaves, a technology support analyst, was never charged by police. His sister was found not guilty of conspiracy to defraud and of money laundering in the March trial that saw her father convicted. She’s still a tax adviser. Neither responded to e-mails seeking comment. Greaves, who’s appealing his conviction and sentence, declined to comment through his London-based lawyer, James Nicholls at Bark & Co.
Money from ROK’s accounts was funneled in 2004 to New Haven Trust Co., a Liechtenstein-based investment firm, police evidence shows. New Haven has its own colorful history. The firm’s director, Mario Staggl, helped set up accounts for billionaire Igor Olenicoff to evade U.S. tax liabilities. U.S. prosecutors separately indicted Staggl in court in Fort Lauderdale, Florida in April 2008 for allegedly helping wealthy Americans evade taxes. He has since been declared a fugitive. Staggl’s Vaduz, Liechtenstein-based lawyer, Andreas Schurti, declined to comment. Greaves’s clients have also attracted the attention of prosecutors. His first firm, Allen & Greaves Ltd., audited the accounts of two companies investigated in 2002 by the U.K. Serious Fraud Office. No charges were brought in the case, which centered on share-selling scams and pushing overpriced claret to wine investors. Rolston Allen, Greaves’s former partner at the firm, said in an e-mail that he considered himself a victim of Greaves and had cut off contact with him seven years ago. Damak falsely asserted that it held a stockbroker license from the St. Lucian regulator, investigators say. It bought blocks of shares-both publicly and in private, over-the-counter sales-in companies like ValiRx, which callers like Samuel would try to flog to Britons. Back in London, ROK handled Damak’s paperwork and shifted the money to an HSBC Holdings Plc bank account in Hong Kong. Share certificates, when they existed, were also mailed by ROK. Today, Botcher and Jenkins, the men who ran Blackwell, are serving prison sentences after pleading guilty in a London court in February to breaching two financial regulations and to money laundering. Botcher’s lawyer, John Milner at London-based Irwin Mitchell LLP, says his client is appealing the 45-month sentence and believed that Blackwell investors were high-net-worth individuals. Jenkins, who is appealing his 21-month sentence, was an administrator at a firm that fell afoul of the U.K. financial regulator, says his Manchester, England-based lawyer, Mike Brunskill at Pannone LLP. Botcher had been recruited to the Greaves operation by Roozbeh Yazdanian, a fourth defendant, who also pleaded guilty to regulatory offenses. Yazdanian, 38, is appealing his sentence and declined to comment through his law firm, Russell Jones & Walker. The downfall of Greaves’s empire can be traced partly to a deal made with Ulrik Debo, another Dane. Debo was the majority investor in London-based Pantera Oil and Gas Plc, which was drilling in the Chaco Basin in Paraguay. He wanted to pull his money out to reinvest but couldn’t find a buyer.
“Ulrik has this problem: He’s got a quarter of a million pounds’ worth of stock stuck in this company,” explains Hall of the City of London Police. “Henrik turns around and says, ‘We might be able to do something about that.’” Botcher brokered a meeting in May 2006 with Greaves, who said Damak Group would buy the stock.
Filings show that Pantera sold Debo’s 1,256,367 shares at 2.67 pence each to Damak in August 2006. Damak resold them to investors through Blackwell for 12 pence each. Blackwell’s salesmen promised that the company would soon list on London’s AIM. It never did. “I lost every penny I put into that company,” says Debo, who’s now the chief executive officer of London-based DeBondo Capital. He gave testimony in court and didn’t face any allegations of wrongdoing. He declined to comment further.
Pantera changed its name to Artemis Energy Plc in December 2007. The brand has been tainted through association with Damak, says Mahesh Patel, Artemis’s company secretary. “We’ve not been able to raise a dime,” he says. Operation Storm, which triggered the end of Greaves’s adventure, was sparked when a victim contacted police in November 2006 and complained about losing money on Pantera stock after investing through Blackwell Advisors. The investor passed the police Damak’s share invoices, which had ROK’s address printed on them. Officers raided the Bruton Street offices and froze ROK’s bank account. Hong Kong police then froze about 400,000 pounds in the HSBC account where cash had been routed.
As police closed in, Jenkins, the Blackwell Web guru, booked a day-return flight from Barcelona to the U.K. and tried to withdraw about 50,000 pounds from his account. The bank tipped off the police, who arrested him. The game was up. Such successful prosecutions are rare, because resources are stretched and responsibility for fighting boiler rooms is shared between the police and the FSA. London’s Operation Archway, set up two years ago, has fewer than 10 full-time police officers. The FSA can freeze assets believed to belong to boiler rooms and can prosecute only U.K.-based operations or individuals. “I found out that, overall, the FSA were useless, the police were understaffed and weren’t given enough resources,” says Nigel Evans, a lawmaker in Britain’s Conservative Party who argues that the police need more manpower. His party, which is ahead of the ruling Labour Party in most U.K. polls, has pledged to abolish the FSA if it wins the next election and hand regulatory power back to the Bank of England. Even if the authorities do succeed in taking down a boiler room, British jail sentences for company-related fraud tend to be just a fraction of penalties handed to their U.S. counterparts, whose terms increase in proportion to the size of thefts. “Criminals who defraud people of hundreds of millions of pounds and who ruin thousands of lives should face the threat of significant prison sentences,” says Margaret Cole, enforcement director for the FSA. “Prosecuting individuals for conducting unauthorized business, which carries a two-year maximum term, simply does not do justice to the offense and certainly not to the victims.” Back in Carlisle, Reay is still paying the price for her mistake. She’s on suckers’ lists being passed around illegal companies. “I’ve had 150 phone calls over three years -- sometimes it’s twice a week,” she says. “Someone could call me up now and offer me the best thing in the world and I wouldn’t believe them.” The police say there’s a simple way to fight boiler room fraud: When a stranger calls and starts talking about your investments, hang up the phone -- no matter how posh the caller sounds.

Civil Guard Colonel?

60 year old man, named by Europa Press as A.L.L., has been arrested by the Murcia Civil Guard after posing as a Colonel in the force for the past nine years. He always carried with him a Civil Guard badge and is understood to have often quoted details of the career history of high-ranking members of the force to give added credence to his claim.Even his former partner, who he was with for five years, believed he was a Civil Guard colonel during the time they lived together.The man used his supposed position to force backhanders out of businesses in Los Alcázares, San Javier, los Narejos and Murcia City with the threat of closing them down if they failed to accede to his demands.The investigation began two months ago after a man whose car was intentionally set alight refused to present an official complaint for fear of reprisals from the arsonist, presumably the false Civil Guard who is now in custody.

Four Civil Guards from Almuñecar, arrested for drug trafficking, on Friday and found with 2,000 kilos of hashish, have been denied bail

Four Civil Guards from Almuñecar, arrested for drug trafficking, on Friday and found with 2,000 kilos of hashish, have been denied bail and sent to prison by Duty Court Number Two in Torrox. One of the four is now known to have been previously based in Nerja.Five other people were also detained on Friday, which saw a large number of police vehicles arriving and leaving from both the Civil Guard barracks in Nerja and in Almuñecar as members of the Internal Affairs division arrived from Madrid. The five others arrested are now reported to include a man from Málaga and two from Cueta.Two of the Civil Guards were caught ‘in fraganti’ when they were moving the drugs in the Güi river in Torrox Costa.More arrests have not been ruled out in the case, which is the third of this type in the past decade.

Madrid, police shoot and wound armed man.

José Luis AT, was shot by police after waving and firing a weapon at them in the Madrid district of Hortaleza, reported a spokesman for Police Headquarters. The man, who had previous convictions for theft and violence, poor was admitted to the Clinical Hospital in Madrid after receiving at least four bullet wounds in the lower limbs of his body, including the buttocks and abdomen. The event occurred from 1700 hours today at number 6 Calle Manizales, when an anonymous caller alerted police to the presence in the way of a man who brandished a gun in his hand.
A National Police patrol moved in and asked this man to take out his hands from his pockets and to raise his arms, the man responded with several bursts of gunfire.
In this situation, the officers then had to use force to subdue the man. At the scene police found a bag in which he had several guns and knives

Jose Munoz, 55, head of the Malaga brotherhood of Gitanos, was shot twice inside his car by a fellow gypsy.

Jose Munoz, 55, head of the Malaga brotherhood of Gitanos, was shot twice inside his car by a fellow gypsy.The suspect, D.R.F, 18, from Almeria, was later arrested by police at a roadblock in Algodonales, Cadiz province, as he tried making his getaway in a taxi. Police now fear that the shooting may spark gypsy warfare and retribution crimes within the city.A police spokesman said: “He was immediately taken to Malaga police station and not to Ronda for fear of reprisals.”The incident took place at 14:30 in an area known as La Indiana – just metres away from the back entrance to the local army barracks. Munoz – a furniture salesman – had been seen earlier with the suspect in Almeria and was driving back to his farm before the shooting took place.The two men reportedly began arguing over a business matter while heading to a livestock fair held in the area. The youth immediately fled the scene and called for a taxi at a nearby hotel – where he reportedly waited calmly for it to arrive.
“He was immediately taken to Malaga police station and not to Ronda for fear of reprisals.”However, an onlooker – already aware of the shooting – alerted the police.
Just over an hour later, the vehicle was intercepted in the gaditana district of Algodonales.The taxi driver was intially arrested but, after proving his identity, was subsequently released.The murder of the popular Munoz has shocked Ronda and even prompted mayor Antonio Marin Lara to send his condolences to the victim’s family. Meanwhile, police are searching for a motive behind the fatal attack. Malaga province has now been the setting for 18 homicides this year, four more than the whole of 2008.

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

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Throat cut outside Barraca disco in Sueca, Valencia.

24 year old woman has died after having her throat cut in a fight with another woman in her 30’s outside a discotheque in Sueca, Valencia.The owners of the Barraca disco where it happened have given their condolences to the family of the victim, and issued a statement expressing their ‘tremendous consternation’ at what had happened, and underlining that the disco staff are collaborating fully with the police to try and establish exactly what took place.It happened around 7am on Sunday morning and reports say both women were local residents in the La Ribera area. The SAMU health team called to the scene could do no more than confirm the death.

Diamond robbery was masterminded by a trio of British youths

Diamond robbery was masterminded by a trio of British youths, it can be revealed.The gang – who have been charged with more than 30 robberies – regularly took ‘a civilised’ full English breakfast at 4pm each afternoon, near their Coin home.The dangerous gang – who had weapons in the garage of their rented Sierra Gorda property – were however, always impeccably polite at their regular meeting spot Leslie’s Bar.“They were always very well-mannered,” a waitress told the Olive Press. “I liked them, so I was surprised when they were arrested for these crimes.”
The group – which includes one woman – have been arrested over an incredible 30 or more robberies and burglaries, amassing a booty of luxury items over the last few years.The group – who kept a series of dangerous Staffordshire bull terrier dogs at their home – came from England, Wales and Ireland.According to sources they had lived in the area for up to two years, renting luxury detached villas in the Coin and Alhaurin el Grande area.They lived a ‘low key’ lifestyle, but wore designer clothes, expensive watches and other top accessories. mijas diamond robbery but police became suspicious of their extravagant way of life following a 30,000 euro robbery at the Mijas Diamond and Jewellery Centre.They had previously visited the jewellers and carefully sketched plans of the layout of the shop, before raiding a few weeks later.After police obtained a search warrant for their rented home they found designer furniture and other items, including a 9,000 euro Bang & Olufsen TV, and a stolen Volvo in the garage. They also recovered a selection of weapons.
According to a police spokesman the robberies and burglaries were well planned and executed.He said: “In the Mijas robbery the gang posed as tourists on an excursion. The day of the robbery they dressed up as building workers and erected barriers in the street, before smashing the shop window.”They are also alleged to have raided private homes in the area, while the Volvo was stolen from a Chinese resident in Coin at gunpoint.The downfall of the gang was keeping the best of what they stole and only selling on the rest.Police believe the gang may have had three more accomplices.

e-mail on the Costa del Sol,can seriously damage your wealth

If you can’t wait to surf the Web or check your e-mail on the Costa del Sol, a few words of advice: Think twice about it. Or maybe three or four times.Roaming with your BlackBerry or iPhone abroad to simply make voice calls will cost you an arm and a leg. Using it to surf the Web or send e-mail could cost you your whole body, with bills running into the hundreds of dollars. Early iPhone users learned this the hard way; AT&T forgave some of the most outrageous bills and cautioned users to turn off the automatic e-mail checking that was eating up data usage.But even if you use your smartphone to check e-mail and send photos manually, you could be headed for trouble. And the problem is made worse by the skimpy information provided on the Web sites of the two main GSM wireless providers in the United States: AT&T and T-Mobile. (GSM is the predominant system used in Europe. Sprint and Verizon use CDMA, and most of their phones will not work in Europe.)Both companies’ Web sites state the cost to use data when roaming. But it’s priced in megabytes, a measurement that means nothing to most people. (Can you imagine if your wireless plan told you how many MB of data you could use, rather than how many minutes you had?)How much data you use to send a text or visit a Web site depends on whom you’re asking. T-Mobile’s site says that a text message uses about 3KB, and visiting a Web site will eat up between 250 to 500 KB a page, depending on how many images are on the site.AT&T’s site does not state an equivalency between Web-page access and the amount of data used, although a spokesman said that the company would add that information soon. According to AT&T, visiting a Web site could use 50 to 75 KB a page and checking three e-mail messages could eat up 60 KB

Stephen Mallon surrounded by a gang of 30 men and hurled off a 25ft balcony.

Stephen Mallon, 49, was pelted with bottles, glasses and other missiles after going to the aid of his two teenage sons outside a village bar.He was then surrounded by the mob and hurled off a 25ft balcony.Mr Mallon, from Bournemouth, was yesterday in a coma at a hospital in Malaga, with his distraught wife Teresa at his bedside.
The attack happened in Competa, an hour from the Costa del Sol, where the family has had a holiday home for six years.One of the sons had his nose broken in the violence, while the other suffered a broken arm.A family member said: "They were set upon by a gang of 30 men because they were English."

Voodoo curses human trafficking gang charged on Saturday at a court in the southwestern city of Huelva

Spanish police say they have arrested the ringleaders of a human trafficking ring that allegedly brought Nigerian women to Spain and forced them into prostitution by threatening them with voodoo curses.Many of the 23 suspects arrested in nationwide raids were being charged on Saturday at a court in the southwestern city of Huelva.
Police say the arrests were triggered by a woman who in February told police of the gang's intimidation tactics.The victims, aged 25 to 35, were forced to pay large sums of money to the gang members, who told the women they would go mad or have their souls destroyed if they disobeyed orders given during voodoo rituals held in Nigeria involving pieces of their fingernails or hair.

La Costa Nostra, or Our Coast.

Neapolitan gangsters, including the alleged fugitive boss 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 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."The nickname of purported boss Raffaele Amato is "the Spaniard." He partied in Marbella, a beachfront refuge of high-rolling international desperadoes and dubious fortunes. Investigators say he set up multinational cocaine deals in Barcelona. Moving among Spanish hide-outs, he allegedly waged a long-distance war for the housing projects in Naples that are the heart of his empire. And he speaks Spanish like a native.Amato's capture Saturday was a major victory for Italian investigators. The balding 44-year-old gained notoriety for allegedly 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.The Camorra's intense activity in Spain reveals evolving alliances and shifting global crime networks, investigators say. Starting about seven years ago, Amato was a key player in a number of decisive underworld sit-downs in Spain, the gateway for Latin American cocaine smuggled into Europe, said 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 cooperation. Amato was arrested in 2005 in Barcelona but was later released 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, surveillance and wiretaps paid off 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."

Estepona breakwater 50 year old British tourist who was assaulted by a group of youths on a beach

50 year old British tourist who was assaulted by a group of youths on a beach .
He was hit over the head with a bottle and stabbed twice in the back in the area near the Estepona breakwater, where numerous young people go to drink alcohol at weekends.It appears that the victim was having a drink with a woman, also British, when, just before four o’clock in the morning, he was attacked by a group of five youths of North African origin who had been sitting on the sand just a few metres away from the couple.After the youths had fled the scene the victim’s companion helped him onto the Avenida de España where they were picked up by a Local Police patrol. The tourist was taken to the nearest health centre and then transferred to the Costa del Sol Hospital, where he was admitted for treatment for the two stab wounds, one in the kidney area and the other near the left shoulder blade.

Danish citizen who was wanted by Great Britain for alleged crimes of robbery, fraud and money laundering has been arrested in Fuengirola.

Danish citizen who was wanted by Great Britain for alleged crimes of robbery, fraud and money laundering has been arrested in Fuengirola. A European warrant had been issued by the British courts for the arrest of T.G.G.K. (30), who has allegedly done dozens of people out of more than three million pounds sterling (almost five million euros). The victims of the swindle had bought shares in different companies that were worth nothing. T.G.G.K. was wanted for a total of fourteen alleged crimes related to fraud and money laundering committed between 2003 and 2006.
The Spanish police unit dedicated to finding fugitives has also arrested British I.S.J. (24) in Formentera del Segura in Alicante and German E.K. (59) in Els Poblets - also in Alicante. The British man was wanted in his country for robbery, misappropriation and damages committed in 2006 in Chorley, England. The German courts were looking for E.K. for crimes of fraud and document forgery committed between 2003 and 2005 when he worked as a financial assessor.