The National Police have detained two of the 19 migrants who were saved by Maritime Rescue on Friday, 22nd May, 44 miles off the coast of Alicante after they were found to be the commanders of the unstable ship.
Agents of Group III of the Unit against Immigration Networks and Document Fraud (UCRIF) of Alicante have detained people on suspicion of assisting irregular immigration and being members of a criminal organisation.
After a pre-trial detention hearing with a protected witness who was on the boat and identified them to the police as the pilots during the crossing, they were brought before a judge this morning for a detention hearing. The judge placed the two detainees in pretrial detention at the conclusion of the session.
Context
The two men who were apprehended were Algerians, ages 37 and 35, who had prior criminal convictions for using false identities to cross the Atlantic illegally in tiny boats. One of them had travelled via Alicante once, and the other five times through Cartagena, Almería, and Alicante. Additionally, they were prohibited from travelling to Switzerland and Germany.
One of the arrested people identified one of the migrants from the boat as someone who typically spends six months in France and the remainder of the year conducting crossings as a pilot of these dangerous watercraft. The inquiry immediately connects them to illegal immigration schemes.
A relative of one of the rescued migrants paid 7,000 euros for the trip of two persons, according to information gathered by the National Police of Alicante.
As a protected witness, one of the people rescued from the boat told the police that the boat departed from an Algerian beach at four in the morning on the 20th with the goal of reaching Ibiza. However, due to strong winds and waves, they had to veer off course until they ran out of fuel.
They set out with 400 litres of fuel, but according to the witness, 470 litres were required. As a result, they became adrift and requested assistance from a ship, which notified Maritime Rescue.
The protected witness claims that prior to sailing, they were advised to switch off their phones so as not to film the departure and to claim that everyone had paid for the excursion in the event that the authorities found them. In order to give the impression that everyone had navigated the boat, they were also required to run its engine for a while.
They crossed without the use of life jackets or other safety gear, and since they didn’t have GPS, they used a mobile phone compass for navigation.
Other Articles
