Four men who impersonated police officers to rob drug trucks have been imprisoned.

BarcelonaA court in Pamplona has remanded four of the five people arrested in custody for allegedly belonging to a group that impersonated police officers to rob trucks transporting drugs. The investigation began in late April following two robberies of truck drivers in Arazuri (Navarra) and Celrà (Girona). The Catalan Police (Mossos d'Esquadra) and the Navarra Regional Police (Policía Foral de Navarra) were involved in the case. Investigators describe the arrested individuals as a "highly specialized and violent" group that focused on detecting trucks from North Africa carrying drugs hidden among their cargo. To impersonate police officers, the suspects displayed firearms and police badges to the truck drivers. They also handcuffed the drivers, who were unaware that they were transporting hidden drugs and were themselves victims of organizations that took advantage of the situation by concealing the drugs in their vehicles. In the case of Navarre, the victim was assaulted and kidnapped and taken to Catalonia, where he was eventually released. In a joint operation, both police forces arrested the suspects between October 13 and 15. During the press conference held this Wednesday to detail the investigation, the chief commissioner of the Criminal Investigation Division of the Navarre Police, Miguel Ruiz, explained that the first robbery attributed to the detainees took place in an industrial park in Arazuri (Navarre). In that case, the victim had just parked a truck from Morocco that was transporting electrical components for vehicles. As soon as he parked, two cars appeared, and several people got out, impersonating police officers. They assaulted the truck driver, handcuffed him, and forced him into one of the vehicles. Then one of the assailants took the wheel of the truck and drove him to Catalonia. During the journey, the truck driver was assaulted several times while the now-detained individuals questioned him about whether he was carrying hashish hidden in the truck. They eventually abandoned him at a designated spot between Cunit and Cubelles, next to the truck's cab. The driver was able to recover the semi-trailer two days later, near the location where he had been released. While some of the cargo was missing, some of it was damaged, and the truck's bodywork was also damaged. Upon returning to Navarre, he reported the incident to the Foral Police.

Second robbery in Catalonia

The Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police) superintendent, Carlos Otamendi, explained that two days after the robbery in Navarre, a very similar one occurred in Celrà. In that case, two truck drivers coming from Tangier, Morocco, were assaulted by three men who displayed a firearm and police insignia. They were pulled from the truck, handcuffed, their documents and cell phones were taken, and the vehicle was stolen. The assailants arrived at the scene in the same cars that had already been linked to the Navarre robbery, allowing investigators to connect the cases. According to Otamendi, the officers quickly realized that it could be a "well-known" organization in Catalonia. The superintendent specified that the group's leader had 44 prior police records for robberies, drug trafficking, and drug-related assaults. In fact, the police had been tracking them since 2007.