Iona Napier
A MALAGA man has been arrested for allegedly kidnapping a three-year-old boy while dressed as an FBI agent after the child’s mother ‘turned her back’.
The mother noticed when he was 60ft away and intercepted the child at the Malaga carnival on Saturday evening.
The 47-year-old suspect had been seen among the other carnival goers wearing a shirt with FBI printed on it, and carrying ‘toy handcuffs’.
Partygoers saw him allegedly grab the boy and leave the scene, and managed to stop him with the mother’s help.
Fortunately, a relative of the mother had captured 20 seconds of footage of the attempted kidnap on her smartphone which provided the grounds to keep the suspected abductor behind bars.
The short video reportedly shows a man dressed in black lifting the child up off the ground as the mother dances in front of the person filming.
The suspect was around 60 feet away before the relatives realised the child had gone, but they managed to chase him and intercept the boy.
Although the man told police he had been assaulted, video evidence appeared to show the reverse was true.
The suspect was already known to police but had no previous crimes in connection with child kidnapping.
An appalling amount of perverse, rude and illegal behaviour along the southern coast. Its a reminder of the terribly sad Madeleine case. These kinds of big exploitive, commercial ‘tourism’ centers collect every kind of drunk, thief and pervert imaginable – foreign and domestic. But that’s the market – cheap alcohol, drugs and sexual exploitation.
The ” terribly sad Madeleine case” where some irresponsible, selfish parents abandoned their children to go and eat tapas with their friends?
Every aspect of that case is tragically sad. I don’t blame victims of heinous crimes. But, yes, the new ‘normal’ in Iberian coastal resort towns is to assume the worst.
sad??
you’ve nailed it, not only selfish but downright mean, their joint salaries meant they were very wealthy and that particular complex had experienced child minders that they could easily have used – a little girl paid the price not them.
The perpetrators of child crimes are kidnappers, traffickers and sociopaths, not the parents. For people who have been raised in decent neighborhoods, – wealthy, poor, formally educated or not – crimes against children are mostly unimaginable.
One can, of course, use hindsight to say that other arrangements could have been made. But a decade ago most people who have not been raised in rough places such as tourism sites are, wouldn’t know of such dangers. But now we know that public decency in southern Iberian coastal towns is gone, and people who display open trust make themselves and their children targets.
Visitors from northern countries may be exasperatingly naive in there desire to trust their own judgement in the face of environments they don’t understand, but condemning them out of hand because of their professions is not right.
Kidnapping speaks to the demise of civilized behavior, just as does our new expectations of crazed zealots attempting to behead or shoot people at concerts. Be more vigilant, yes. But we don’t blame the victims.
Chas makes some valid points. It’s easy for people to be holier than thou after the event but let’s not forget, the McCanns are the victims here and the criminal is the evil scumbag who abducted their daughter. My parents left me and my siblings in hotel rooms (and latterly the apartment they bought in Estepona) while on holiday in Spain years ago and I don’t think badly of them because of it. The hotels we stayed in always had dancing in the evening and parents used to put their children to bed at various times throughout the evening and then go back down and resume the entertainment. Everyone did it, it was not just my parents.
Apparently, UK holiday camps used to display signs in ballrooms saying “child crying in chalet X” so people also left their children unattended there.
It’s very easy to blame the McCanns and of course they would act very differently if they had their time again but it’s not as if children were being abducted from hotel rooms/apartments left, right and centre.
If they were working class parents who’d left their children their council house while they went to the pub on he corner for a pint, would you be responding the same way? would the media? would max clifford!
what happened is very sad for the children, but the parents have gone on to become professional victims, tv appearances, book deals.
root cause analysis, what could have prevented their child being “abducted”?
they’re guilty of neglect and abandonment if nothing else, but they’re photogenic and middle class, so , here, have a book deal…..
Yes, I would respond to tragedy without prejudice for anyone regardless of looks, economic position or ideological perspective. For me this is not an issue of class justice; its an issue of compassion.
The McCanns left their children in an unlocked apartment. They did’nt do this on just one night but for their entire holiday.
I remember as a young boy going with my mother to visit her sister. My mother rang the bell and after a minute or so my cousin about 5 years old asked who it was from behind the door “where is your mother” she asked, his answer was I don’t know.
I well remember the rage of my mother leaving a young child alone. It almost came to blows the next time they met – the door to the apartment was locked, unlike the McCanns.
Sad?? has it spot on.
Not everyone has the same street smarts as those intimate with the streets.
I recall that doors were in fact locked with, no doubt, inadequate locks, which in my experience, are commonly used in tourist complexes (I lived for 18 years in Lisbon and during the abduction). There was evidence of entry through a street facing window.
Although hindsight tells us that better security and vigilance, and less trust was in order, we still are not entitled blame crime victims nor withhold compassion. For me that would be mean and selfish.
Chas – the abductor walked through an unlocked door, that’s a fact. At no time did the McCanns deny that.
As sad said, if they had been working class parents, there would have been a totally different reaction from authorities. Almost certainly the McCanns would have been charged with child neglect when they arrived back in the UK.
I have only contempt for the McCanns, they created, deliberately, a media circus and using funds contributed my mugs to threaten anyone with lawyers who dared to criticise them, AFAIK this fund is never audited. There is only one person to feel for and that is the little girl – end of.
Contempt is never in order for crime victims – affluent or not, naive or with street smarts. End of..
So many myths and misconceptions…
First, the weirdo in the story was in no way looking like a real FBI man or police man. He most definately looked like an extra from the village people. (an observation, not a criticism). which was in tune? with the carnival atmosphere.
As for the McCanns comparisons; it seems some here hate the mccanns simply for being ‘liked’ by the media. The express group, to name the worst, deliberately played both ends against the middle for their own benefits. the british embassy supplied a PR expert to help them deal with the media, helping set in motion the escalation… and all the money raised was under constant public scrutany, contrary to popular myths.
So please, get the facts right when commenting on such terrible events.