Faro court ordered probation for four of the five men who had been arrested for acquiring large sums of money withdrawn from banks by business customers who were followed and later robbed.
The group’s members are from Lisbon and Setúbal but were nabbed in Gondomar and hauled down to Faro after a long operation during which the GNR managed to identify the men, largely due to their particular modus operandi.
The gang whose members ranged in age between 60 and 70, acted "with a high degree of organisation and in concerted way right across the country," including in Faro, Setúbal, Aveiro, Lisbon, Leiria, Porto and Braga," according to Faro GNR who added that as the men wore typical 'old men' hats or caps, no one paid any attention to them as they were clocking who came and went from bank branches and how much they were carrying in cash.
Four of the duffers brigade are enjoying some Algarve hospitality in jail for the time being and the fifth has periodically to report in to his local police station.
In the course of the operation that led to the arrest of the gang, some 25 houses were searched as well as businesses and vehicles in Lisbon, Setúbal and the Algarve.
The searches uncovered "large amounts of money, in the order of several hundred thousand euros" and up to a million euros is thought to have been taken by the gang.
The men staked out banks and waited until a customer withdrew a large cash sum. The victim then was followed and robbed.
The GNR in Faro acted in collaboration with their counterparts in Lisbon and Setúbal in an operation lasting ten months. Those arrested already had criminal records for theft.
The gang's recent activities were executed with a "high degree of professionalism and efficiency, helped by their mobility and the extended geographic radius of action."
The GNR also said that efforts are continuing to identify more victims and more of the gang’s associates.
Comments
It sometimes seems to me that such announcements made by the GNR give rise to more questions than they answer.
I echo the previous post but also ... as we are in Portugal - raise the likelihood that some of these big cash withdrawals were themselves from previous 'dodgy' activities. Or intended for buying 'dodgy things'.
So not reported as stolen off them ?
But surely a really sharp copper could cross reference these cash withdrawals to the bank customer ? They will all have given ID in order to collect the money.
The Police then checking that that customer got home safely and invested off-shore or better still in BES (!) without any hiccups ?
Surely bank security cameras will have identified these old boys ? They had to have someone hang around inside the bank - the others waiting around outside. These would then rotate.
They may even have had 'inside help' - bribing bank clerks to know when a big withdrawal was planned. Which would have to be by prior notice so that the safe held the money.
They also travelled the country, so needing fuel for vehicles and buying meals - and would have stood out as 'being different'.
How can it help the GNR 'investigation' - NOT to show us their photo ID's ?
Isn't it obvious to the really bright GNR's that circulating these pictures would have shortened the search for these old boys down to weeks or even days ? Not 10 months !
So avoiding the extra unnecessary thefts ??