COUPLE ARRESTED IN SPAIN FOR ROBBERIES IN 93 CHURCHES

Mon 08 May 2023:

Spanish police arrested a couple who robbed 93 churches in 82 towns in northern Spain, the country’s interior ministry said on Monday.

The Civil Guard has arrested a couple who are accused of at least 93 robberies in churches in 82 towns, the majority in Cantabria but also in Asturias and Palencia. The detainees took the money collected in the brushes and various objects.

The Government delegate in Cantabria, Ainoa Quiñones, reported the details of Operation Sanandrés together with the Bishop of Santander, Manuel Sánchez Monge, and the head of the Civil Guard in the region, Antonio Orantos, at a press conference at the who have shown the 140 objects from churches that were intervened during their detention on April 26.

The robberies targeted money contributed to the churches by worshipers, according to the statement. The first robberies were committed as early as last December in various churches in Cantabria, the ministry said.

The couple, a man and a woman aged 41 and 45, residing in Villacarriedo (Cantabria), were looking for temples far from urban centers and used up to four different vehicles “to avoid the action of the Civil Guard,” Quiñones explained.

The main objective of the robberies was money. In one of the temples, in the Sanctuary of Valvanuz in Cantabria, 1,000 euros were stolen from the donations of the Christmas nativity scene. However, they were not his only target. The couple also took ecclesiastical objects, presumably for later sale, such as iconographies, keys, pianos, radios, loudspeakers or even church chairs, all without much market value.

They also stole from the churches images, cases with oil paintings, small chests with keys to the tabernacles, reliquaries for oleas, temple keys, two carved wooden bases for the coffins, as well as “a large number of small value coins from collections and beggars.” of the churches”.

A house search conducted by the police resulted in the discovery of 140 religious items, including images, cases with oils, small chests with keys to the tabernacles and reliquaries, according to the statement. The police also found coins of small denomination taken from the churches’ alms chests and donation boxes, the ministry added.

The perpetrators also reportedly owned various tools that could be used in robberies, such as crowbars of different sizes, a hydraulic jack, screwdrivers, pliers, and a night-vision device.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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