The National Police have arrested a 47-year-old woman in Almería who posed as a home caregiver to defraud elderly men and allegedly end the life of one of them.
Dressed in the uniform of a company in the sector for which she had worked, she gained the trust of her victims and then robbed them after drugging them with benzodiazepine to render them unconscious.
She had numerous criminal records for similar acts and she had amassed a fortune that allowed her to enjoy numerous luxuries in her home, until last November when she overdid it with medicines and one of her elderly people died.
It was the key clue that he used to find her.
She has been arrested for one crime of homicide, five of robbery with violence, four of serious injuries, one of illegal possession of weapons, another of fraud and one more of theft.
She is already in prison.
When the agents of the Almería provincial police station received the first complaints, they approached their work as a case of robberies with violence.
The first was in March 2023 and soon more joined him, up to five in total.
They all had coincidences.
The protagonist was always a blonde, middle-aged woman wearing a uniform from Clece, a renowned home delivery company in Almería.
All of the victims—always older men—explained that when she approached them—around their homes or even knocking on their doors—the false caregiver had told them about a neighbor, their deceased wives, or someone known in the area.
This way she managed to gain her trust and then offered herself as company.
Then she stole from them.
She did it after she made them ingest, without them realizing it, high doses of benzodiazepine (a very common anxiolytic in Spain).
“It left them unconscious for 24 hours, a very dangerous overdose,” explain sources in the case, who highlight that some of the victims suffered several robberies.
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The last case came to the police in November.
In his complaint, another man explained the same circumstances as the previous four, but there was a novelty: the man—who died weeks later due to massive ingestion of benzodiazepines and methadone—undoubtedly recognized the person who had defrauded and poisoned him.
She was a habitual criminal known to the agents, who undid the path taken until then.
They took statements from the victims again and both one of them and her caregiver also identified the same woman.
The hypothesis is being considered that she had accessed the profiles of her victims during her months of work in a company in the sector or even in previous stages, in which she came to work for the home care service of the Almería City Council.
“Perhaps she obtained the information informally, during conversations with her colleagues,” explains one of the agents who participated in the operation, in which the Homicide, Theft and Money Laundering groups of the Provincial Judicial Police Brigade participated. from Almeria.
“My home is luxury”
The agents then went to his home, but he was not there.
Days later they finally managed to arrest her in another apartment where she had taken refuge.
The interior of her habitual residence was a surprise to investigators.
On the outside it was a humble house intended for social rental and belonging to the Housing and Rehabilitation Agency of the Government of Andalusia, but inside it looked like a luxury mansion.
From the kitchen furniture to the bedroom or the living room lamps—which had built-in speakers—they were from high-end brands.
“My home is luxury,” she told those who took her statement, who point out that all the money that appears in the detainee's accounts does not correspond to the working life of a person dedicated to home care.
Among his belongings were more than 22,000 euros in cash, as well as bank books in the names of third parties, documentation relating to account numbers and transfers or even a donation contract for 20,000 euros.
Also several mobile phones and invoices from gold trading establishments.
In addition, a gun, ammunition and a bulletproof vest were found in his room, believed to be used to protect against possible robbery.
She also had a whole arsenal of medicines seized, as well as prescription books and medical documentation.
The woman, who is charged with the crimes of homicide, robbery with violence, serious injuries, illegal possession of weapons, fraud and theft.
The investigating court number 6 of Almería has ordered the detainee's imprisonment.
The investigation remains open on different fronts.
On the one hand, to find out if there were more victims.
The police explain that it is common for there to be people who prefer not to report out of embarrassment or any other reason, but they also analyze whether there could have been any other related deaths.
“The five people who have reported had caregivers or family members who cared for them, but we do not know if someone else could have died and whether it was confused with a natural death,” sources from the investigation say.
On the other hand, the medical information obtained is analyzed to find out how he accessed so many medicines that are only served by prescription.
And finally, their properties, contracts and the movements of their accounts are examined to try to quantify the extent of the fortune amassed through scams.