A thief who punched a woman and made off with her casino winnings was tracked after police followed a trail of stolen banknotes
A violent street thief who punched a woman was caught by police after leaving a trail of stolen banknotes behind him. The man made off with a bag containing €5,800 (£5,000) in cash that a woman had won in a casino.
Police in Alicante were called to reports of a woman being chased by a man before she was robbed and punched in the nose.
When police arrived and came to her aid, she pointed out the direction in which her attacker had fled. The Policia Nacional set up a cordon to close off possible escape routes for the thief.
But within minutes, they found him trying to run away, as banknotes flew out of the stolen bag onto the street.
The female victim told police she was walking to her hotel in the city centre after leaving a gaming saloon when a man started up a conversation with her and asked her for a cigarette.
When taking the cigarette packet out of her bag, she accidentally dropped a €50 note onto the ground.
She walked on for a few metres when the man suddenly attacked her and snatched her bag containing her money, documents, phone and other personal items.
Officers caught the 46-year-old thief with the victim’s bag in his hands and several banknotes stuffed in his pockets. Other banknotes were retrieved from the pavement.
Authorities described him as ‘uncooperative’ during the arrest before he was carted off to a police station.
The latest attack follows a police warning about scammers on the streets of Alicante who targeted more than 50 people taking money out at cashpoints.
Officers in Alicante have warned ATM users to stay alert to prevent being robbed via a technique known as ‘sowing’.
This distraction theft technique mainly targets vulnerable people, particularly the elderly.
Recently they have arrested two people, one a 39-year-old man, who allegedly stole more than €5,400 from eight victims in Alicante. It allegedly involved 50 cashpoints.
But police have warned they believe there is a wider gang still committing crimes all across Spain, concentrating on cities such as Madrid, Valencia and Granada. They have also been operating in the US and other European cities.
Officers believe this gang began in 2019 after a victim had more than €6,000 stolen using the distraction method, a popular method used by other criminal gangs.
The sowing technique is a distraction method which is usually carried out by two individuals.
The scammers will usually drop a Euro note or ticket next to the ATM while the person is in the middle of withdrawing their cash.
The thieves then signals to the victim that they have dropped it and when the victim bends down to pick it up, the other perpetrator will steal their cash as it is dispensed from the ATM.
On other occasions, the criminals will also log the pin of the victim, steal the card and then use it to make further withdrawals from the victim’s bank account.
