Glenn Wickman
THE Guardia Civil has dismantled a prostitution and drug trafficking gang operating in Gandia and Alzira (Valencia Province).
Four suspects – two men and two women aged 20 to 46 – have been arrested on charges of people and drug trafficking plus money laundering.
Officers seized €36,000 in cash, an undisclosed amount of cocaine and materials for cutting and distributing the substance, four properties valued at €300,000, and a bank account with a balance of more than €40,000.
According to a Guardia Civil press release, the seven women exploited by the gang were forced to convince their clients to stay with them for longer through the consumption of drugs and alcohol, thus bumping up the final bill.
The prostitutes were also made to steal their customers’ credit cards when they were under the influence and pass them through a data machine, taking €20 each time.
The women were forced to sell their bodies in several flats in Gandia and Alzira, with the gang taking advantage of the victims’ vulnerable situation – they were all said to lack residence permits and suffered from drug addiction.
Police reveal that the victims had contracted a debt with their ‘employers’ that continued to escalate, becoming impossible to pay off while the group obtained hefty profits.
The cash was then laundered through a front company, which bought property that was then used as unlicensed brothels.
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