Alex Trelinski
LAST Friday’s killing of two Guardia Civil officers off the coast of Barbate has served as a reminder of the power wielded by drug traffickers in the Campo de Gibraltar area.
Most of them live in Cadiz province and use local ports for narcotic shipments, with one of their residential strongholds being the rural El Zabal district of La Linea.
The neighbourhood- north of the urban area- has even been dubbed as ‘Villa Narco’ due to the illegal activities amongst some of the residents.
El Zabal is officially a 19,000 m2 district with basic undeveloped rural roads.
La Linea’s Urban Planning department describes at as a ‘denatured space of irregular residential occupation that is supported by historic and rural roads’ and a ‘scattered suburb’ connected to the city with illegal buildings.
Since 1995, according to the La Voz de Cadiz newspaper, illegal construction started with luxury villas appearing on large plots of land featuring large swimming pools- all on areas that were designated for industrial warehouses.
The homes have all kinds of security like high walls that prevent you from seeing the property from the outside, cameras, as well as tunnels, huts and hiding places to escape police clutches if raided.
The residences are just two kilometres from La Atunara port and ‘El Cabra’- the arrested drug trafficker who piloted the narcoboat that killed the Guardia officers in Barbate -also has a house there.
For years, authorities have been frequent visitors to El Zabal to arrest drug dealers and plantation growers.
One of the big problems faced by law-enforcement is trying to track down the real owners of the properties.
Many of them are in the name of other people who charge high amounts of money to be listed as the owners.
Rolling in and making arrests is a complex issue, because to execute any arrests without a court order, suspects must be detained while being ‘caught in the act’ of breaking the law.
So although everybody knows that drug traffickers live and carry out their business in El Zabal, they cannot be hauled off to face charges unless they are found committing crimes.
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