Two boys aged 17 and 18 ended up held and extorted after accepting a job as money mules. The Mossos d'Esquadra arrested three men without the victims suffering physical harm.
An offer to earn money effortlessly ended with two boys aged 17 and 18 held in an apartment and their families paying large sums of money. One of them was a minor. The Mossos d'Esquadra arrested three individuals, and according to the police, this is not a group involved in organised crime.
It all started when a 19-year-old known as el Chino proposed they receive money in their accounts. The idea was to keep a commission and forward most of it to another person, also a mule, to make it harder for police to trace. The boys accepted, but he first asked for an advance of €2,000 as a deposit, money that he never returned.
When the young men asked for explanations, the scammer arranged to meet them in Sarrià around ten at night. There, three people forced them into a van and took them to an apartment in the La Mina neighbourhood of Sant Adrià de Besòs.
In the apartment, the captives faced threats and extortion. The criminals unlocked their phones using facial recognition, took out loans in their names, and demanded money from their families. One boy's mother received messages at four in the morning on October 16, in which her son said he needed €4,000. In the morning, she transferred €1,000, and later they demanded another €5,000 as her son's debt.
The other mother paid two amounts of €1,000 to free her 17-year-old son, who had been kidnapped along with his friend. By nine-thirty in the morning, they were allowed to leave, but one of the victims was forced to pay €3,000 more a few days later. In total, the scammers took €12,200, and the families filed a complaint.
The Mossos arrested the three men on Friday, November 6, and brought them before the courts. They were released after giving their statements last Monday. The victims did not suffer injuries, according to police information, and the case has highlighted the easy money offers circulating among young people in Barcelona and its metropolitan area.
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