Man arrested in Montpellier for robbing a taxi at knifepoint in Barcelona

BarcelonaA taxi driver was robbed of his vehicle on Thursday morning in Barcelona. According to the ARA, at around 12:15 a man threatened a taxi driver and the female customers he was carrying at knifepoint and threw them out of the vehicle. He then took the taxi and fled. The incident occurred at the intersection of Calle Mallorca and Paseo de Sant Joan, in the Eixample district. The Mossos d'Esquadra have opened an investigation and, after suspecting that the vehicle was already in Catalunya Nord, have notified the French police authorities. At around 6 p.m., the gendarmerie intercepted the vehicle on the A9 motorway, near Montpellier, and arrested the alleged perpetrator of the robbery, who had managed to flee the country.

According to sources familiar with the matter, the taxi driver was stopping right at the intersection of these streets. The girls had already gotten out of the car. Suddenly, a man opened the door and showed him a large knife. He spoke a foreign language and the taxi driver did not understand what he was saying. However, feeling threatened, he got out of the taxi and the robber sat in the driver's seat and fled at full speed. With the clients' phone he managed to call the taxi centre and 112. The driver, with more than 20 years of experience driving a taxi, is deeply affected, according to union sources.

At that moment, a police search began, but also a search of the sector, to find the taxi. Initially, the Mossos d'Esquadra provided the characteristics of the vehicle, a Toyota Prius hybrid, at the control centres of Barcelona city and in the southern and northern metropolitan regions. However, as the hours passed, it began to be suspected that the thief had managed to leave the country. This has caused the Mossos to contact the French police, who have managed to stop him almost 200 kilometres from the border, when he had already arrived in Montpellier. The arrested man was still driving the taxi.

Mobilisation of the sector

In parallel, the taxi sector has also been mobilised to find the vehicle. Within a few minutes of the theft, the registration number and the licence number of the affected driver had already been provided in case a colleague saw the vehicle. Motivational messages to find the vehicle were being sent out by the groups. "We have to catch it," they were saying while following its latest movements.

In this regard, union sources point out that throughout the afternoon they have received information from Catalunya Nord indicating that they had seen the taxi in the first service area of Catalunya Nord, in Banyuls. Afterwards, it continued towards Marseille, according to the same sources, and they have seen it again in a new service area even further up. Taxi drivers in Catalunya Nord have also been notified in case they see it and taxi drivers here were considering going to France to find it.

It is not yet clear why the man stole the taxi and where he was going, although everything points to him going to Marseille. Police sources insist that it is common practice to steal a vehicle after committing a crime in order to escape. However, it is not so common for this vehicle to be a taxi, since it rarely goes unnoticed. Stolen cars are also often used to commit the same crime, such as transporting drugs or crashing into a shop window and robbing the inside of the shop, they add.