He snuck up to the hotel reception desks at the time of check of customers. He listened to the conversations with the receptionist and wrote down the names of the guests and their room numbers and subsequently impersonated them and requested a new card due to forgetfulness or loss and entered their rooms and ransacked them. This was the modus operandi of a citizen of Serbian origin, 51 years old, resident in a municipality of Toledo and arrested by agents of the National Police in Madrid on 10 October after having forcibly committed his latest robbery in a hotel in Chamartín. Another 14 robberies are attributed to him between the months of May and October in hotel facilities in Madrid and the Balearic Islands. In total he managed to steal money and objects worth over 100 thousand euros, according to police sources.
Officers from the robbery section of the National Police Headquarters in Madrid began tracking the suspect in the robberies last May, while their colleagues from the Balearic Islands did so in August. In both cases after complaints from tourists involved in the robberies. The course of both investigations led officers to the same individual who they finally identified last October in Arganzuela with a good part of the personal effects of his latest victims, guests of a hotel in the Chamartín area.
His tactic has always been the same: “He convinced the employees by posing as a customer, claiming that his entrance key did not work and that the password to the safe had been blocked, thus obtaining them to facilitate access to both”, underline police sources in a note sent on Thursday. He almost always acted in the afternoon, because then there was less chance of being discovered by his victims, who were almost always outside the hotel at that time.
Before his arrest on October 10, the man had been arrested two days earlier, after having robbed a hotel room also in the capital district of Chamberí, where he had also been identified as having committed another robbery committed in May. After his identification, officers ascertained that he was accused of eight other robberies in Ibiza, four in Palma de Mallorca and a judicial complaint in Bilbao for a crime of robbery with violence.
Complaints
Following the report of his latest victim on October 8, who stated that his personal belongings had been stolen from inside the hotel room where he was staying, officers launched a search which culminated, just five hours later, in the location of the alleged perpetrator in the Arganzuela neighborhood. Among his personal effects were found the effects and documentation that he had stolen that same night. Due to these events, he was arrested as the alleged perpetrator of the crime of robbery by force.
Previously, in May, another customer of another hotel in Chamartín had reported that they had entered his room by forcing the door and that various personal effects and cash had been taken, as well as his credit cards. And, in August, as the investigation progressed, detectives learned of another robbery that occurred in the same hotel with similar characteristics. Furthermore, in this case, with the stolen cards they had made several fraudulent charges in different businesses, for an amount of almost 1,000 euros.
Investigated in Ibiza
Once arrested, investigators were able to verify that the same man was under investigation for having committed eight other robberies in six hotels on the island of Ibiza, committed between 17 and 19 August. In just two days he managed to seize cash and luxury items for an amount exceeding 38 thousand euros. Investigators have ascertained that to carry out the robberies he used a rented motorcycle, which allowed him to move quickly between the hotel facilities.
He had also committed four other robberies in the Balearic Islands on August 26 and 29, in which he presented himself as a customer, providing his surname and room number. He thus convinced the employees that he was the real guest and managed to access both the rooms of his victims and their safes. He thus seized cash and personal effects worth 60 thousand euros.
The arrested man is accused of a total of 15 forcible robberies in hotel facilities in Madrid and the Balearic Islands and of a crime of forgery of documents. After he was brought to justice, the judge ordered that he be placed in provisional prison.
