The National Police has arrested the Spanish Erick de Ventura Pacheco,
Peru
, in a supermarket in Toledo, one of the national criminals who had recently joined the list of the most wanted criminals in Europe.
The very dangerous arrested man is an old acquaintance of the security forces, since he was the lieutenant of the gang of thieves and kidnappers led for years by Ángel Suárez Flores, better known as
Casper,
now deceased.
The Europol file details that Peru is accused of kidnappings to facilitate
overturning
or drug thefts from other gangs, usually with violence.
He had been on the run since 2014, but since his inclusion on the most wanted list in September, many calls from citizens ended up locating him in Toledo, where he was arrested despite the fact that he had changed his face and was "almost unrecognizable."
De Ventura is accused of "at least 36 crimes such as drug trafficking, illegal detention, torture, threats, kidnapping and the like," for which he is being sentenced to 965 years in prison, according to a police note released this morning. “The criminal group was dedicated to stealing large quantities of illegal drugs from other traffickers,” Europol points out, noting that De Ventura “was an expert in different technical and computer tools,” it adds.
For years he was a key player in one of the "most dangerous and violent gangs in Spain", led by Casper, a thief, kidnapper, torturer and drug trafficker who went down in Spanish criminal history for the theft of 19 paintings at the home of the businesswoman Esther Koplowitz in August 2001, and became a police obsession for a decade.
Erick de Ventura mugshot.
The remnants of Casper's gang had been engaged in a highly lucrative and high-risk business for the past decade: tipping.
The first trace of this activity dates back to 2009, when the gang disguised itself as civil guards to kidnap and torture a ship consignee from Algeciras (they cut off his big toe with a machete) to steal a shipment of cocaine that they did not receive. belonged.
The police detail that, after numerous calls from neighbors, a surveillance device was set up in a town in Toledo as a result of specific information received at the end of last year.
He lived in a house with other men, but the supposed Peru was nothing like the man who came to sit next to Casper in the National Court.
Thinner, long beard, always wearing a cap and dark glasses, in case he left the house... "The surveillance and monitoring device was maintained over time for days, until on January 9 it was observed how A person came out of the house hiding his face with a hat and black glasses,” the police explained.
Three agents followed the piece, until he entered a supermarket, in a remote area, where he took off his glasses and two agents were able to look directly at his face and recognize him, "thanks to a dimple in the right nostril as well as a mole in the middle of the right cheek.
He gave up and allowed himself to be stopped without resisting.