Police have arrested a 32-year-old man in Alicante for allegedly stealing by deploying a frequency jammer in cars. It is thought that the suspect is responsible for as many as six crimes. He was able to get into the cars by deploying a signal jammer to disable the frequency of the electronic locking system.
The National Police said in a statement that this happened because the owners were electronically locking their automobiles after parking, which stopped them from locking. The inquiry started when investigators from the Judicial Police at the Alicante Central Police Station saw that multiple allegations submitted in March about thefts from cars, mostly high-end cars, followed the same pattern. All of the cars had electronic locks, and there were no indicators of forced entry, such smashed windows or locks that had been destroyed. The victims all agreed that they had parked their car in a parking lot and locked it with either the key/remote or the automatic proximity detection lock. But when they went back to recover their car, they saw that their things had been stolen, even though the car didn’t look like it had been stolen, even though they were sure that it was impossible for the car to be left unlocked after being parked.
Frequency Jammer
The investigators contemplated the hypothesis of a potential modus operandi involving the execution of the act through a frequency inhibitor that would disable the electronic locks, with the perpetrator’s area of operation being the city centre parking lots, where a significant influx of tourists gathers. The police at the Central District Police Station set up a special operation to prevent and watch over the city’s parking lots in order to figure out what was going on. As a result of the operation, the plainclothes officers who were there saw a man who was acting suspiciously approach a car, open the door, and get inside. They didn’t see any lights on the car, which is what happens when the remote unlocking system is working properly. So, the agents stopped this man and asked him if he owned the car. At first, he said no, that it belonged to a friend, but the agents later ruled that out when they found inconsistencies in his statements. They then searched him as a precaution and found a hammer specifically for breaking glass and a remote control that looked like a garage door opener but was actually a frequency jammer. Because of the evidence and other known facts about the possible suspect’s physical appearance, the agents arrested the man they had stopped as the suspect in a robbery with force that took place inside a vehicle.
They also said that he was responsible for the events that had been reported earlier. Later, it was found that the individual who was arrested had an outstanding arrest warrant from a city court for robbery with force. He was also told that he was being arrested for this reason. After the police finished their work, the detainee was turned over to the duty investigating courts in the municipality of Alicante.
