Robberies in the homes of distracted neighbors during the festival

GausasSummer is a time for major festivals. These are important days on the calendar for many small towns that, once a year, organize popular events and nighttime celebrations in the squares to foster communion between neighbors and visitors. This summer, however, GausasIn , a small town in the Baix Empordà region with around sixty inhabitants, what was supposed to be an evening of celebration and fun ended unexpectedly. On the night of Saturday, August 16th, during the long weekend of Our Lady of the Assumption, while concerts were being held in the square, a group of thieves secretly broke into several homes in the town. Taking advantage of the festive atmosphere, with people distracted and a lot of movement from outsiders, the criminals took the opportunity to go unnoticed and rummage through the drawers of some of the town's farmhouses in search of valuables.

When some locals noticed, they alerted the audience over the PA system from the stage just after midnight. Everyone was so scared that it was decided to cancel the last performance of the evening, the DJ's, as his family was among those affected and they weren't in the mood for revelry. This is how a family member, who is part of the festival committee, tells it: "We were all having dinner in the square and, I don't know why, halfway through dinner it occurred to me to stop by the house to check that everything downstairs was locked. Everything was fine, but I made the mistake of not checking if the upstairs window was okay; closed, it's not easy. Wedge and sneak in through the mosquito net. Later, my mother went up to the bedroom and found everything in disarray. The house is right next to where the concerts were being held, but the thieves got in through the back without anyone catching them.

As word spread, other neighbors began to notice that their house had also been broken into, although practically nothing of value had been taken. One neighbor commented, stunned, that the thieves had tried to force the door while they were inside, but that, when he yelled at them, they ran away. And one woman even said that she had hooked caught red-handed, The intruders were wearing balaclavas, and the terror had left her terrified. All of this created a certain psychosis in such a small town, where everyone knows each other, there's trust, and neighbors often leave doors or windows open to let in the air without fear of burglary. "They knew what they were doing; they knew it was the main festival," the victims of the robberies confirmed. Then the Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police) arrived, recorded the incident, and calmed the situation. Of course, the festivities were interrupted and everyone was heading home early.

Two burglaries in Vilopriu

And the Gaüses case isn't the only one in the area. A similar incident occurred a few days earlier, on August 9, at the town festival in Vilopriu, just 5 kilometers away. "On Saturday, while the communal dinner was being prepared, some neighbors returned home to find they had been robbed," explains Arnau, a member of the town festival committee. modus operandi It was very similar: climbing through a window high behind the houses while most of the neighbors enjoyed the party. In this case, the Mossos d'Esquadra received reports of two burglaries and the thieves managed to make off with valuable jewelry.

In Vilopriu, most of the attendees were unaware of the robberies that same night, and the party continued relatively normally. However, the events left a very bad taste in the mouths of local residents who live the popular festival with emotion: "We were very surprised, because it's not a town where this happens regularly. It's infuriating that, taking advantage of a dinner with the neighbors, some have a good time and others come to cause harm. It doesn't seem like a coincidence," laments the same neighbor.

Also around the same time, a robbery occurred at the Sant Jordi Desvalls gas station, but, for now, the police have no record of any direct connection between the three crimes committed in just a few days in the region. In fact, the police force, while initially concerned about the events, maintains that, this summer, no alarming pattern has been detected linking local festivals and robberies.