The researchers had before them an extension greater than that of a football field. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack, but the follow-ups they had done for weeks told them that there was something on that farm guarded by two rottweilers. And they were going to find it, "whatever it cost."
They were divided into groups and began a search by grids, similar to the one used in disappearances. They conscientiously searched a mobile home in which the suspects met. Then, two implements booths. Subsequently, three motorhomes. Any space or object that could be a hiding place was thoroughly checked. And nothing. No trace of jewelry or money .
The mood began to slack, but something caught the attention of one of the agents. "He is a country uncle whose parents have a farm" and he missed a small portion of unsettled land. Removed. Different from the one around her.
With a hoe in his hand he began to dig. Something intuited a third party when he called the judicial secretary and decided to record the outcome of his partner's hunch. Moments later, he ran into a solid object. The adrenaline printed speed to the works until they found a kind of box. It was actually a beach cooler wrapped in plastic. Of those common blue and white. Inside, two small metal chests. And inside, almost 60,000 euros in cash , weapons and a multitude of valuable jewels. They had succeeded. They had before them most of the loot of the Daltons . The López López brothers, the famous bank robbers in Malaga , had lost again.
This finding was the culmination of a joint investigation by the National Police and the Mossos d'Esquadra that last February resulted in 13 detainees, who has again taken this author gang to prison for some of the most important robberies of the country and that stood out for the exhaustive preparation of its blows.
The Daltons, raised in the Malagueño neighborhood of Portada Alta , have a long criminal record behind them and have been entering and leaving prison since 2001. "They are professional robbers since they were very young. I can't remember the times I've had David sitting there - the ringleader-", explains one of the investigators while pointing to the chair in which they usually take statements from the detainees.
He and his companions know him perfectly, as do his three brothers, so they had no doubts when they received the images that accompanied an alert launched by the Catalan regional police. "We recognized his way of walking" in the videos of the robbery at a branch of Barcelona in which the Lopez López 'modus operandi' was used: the delay. A system that consists of accessing the bank before opening to open the safe. To do this, they await the start of the workday of employees, who under threats introduce into the entity when they are ready to enter. Or, they perform a butrón from an annex premises and then access the branch and wait for the arrival of the workers.
This second modality is the one used in September of last year to perpetrate a spectacular robbery in Marbella and in which specialists also participated in the opening of boxes with radials and electromechanical tools. The thieves busted two, and tried to open four more, to get a booty of over 200,000 euros between cash and jewelry.
With the certainty that The Daltons were behind both strokes, the National Police and the Mossos formed a joint team and initiated a long and complex investigation that should circumvent the experience of a black leg band.
The robber brothers "are not stupid" and knew they were on the radar of the security forces. Although they tried to "appear normal", the precautions they took in each movement or communication - 32 mobile phones were seized - gave them away.
"During the follow-ups, we observed that they accelerated or slowed down sharply , made several turns before choosing an exit when entering a roundabout or even how they stopped on the shoulder when they were driving on the highway", recalls another of those responsible for the case that doesn't hide the times that "we had to let them go so they wouldn't discover us".
Aesthetic operations
David, nicknamed The Ear , exercised leadership despite not being the eldest of the four brothers. He had earned it. Away from the usual profile of the bank robber, this young lover of contact sports, fashion venues and trips to paradisiacal destinations in good company, also stood out for his academic and cultural concerns.
Law student at the University of Malaga, on more than one occasion he was 'accompanied' by police officers while preparing exams in the library. And in social networks he left a mark of his interest in reading. The title of the last work he showed to his followers seems a reflection of his ambitious character: This is how the world is dominated, by Pedro Baños, the colonel of the Earth Army expert in geopolitics who sounded like director of National Security.
The leader of the Daltons was meticulous and did not take false steps , but it was clear that he risked his skin to enjoy life. He was passionate about traveling and alternating in restaurants and bars. Sometimes, with his brothers and friends; in others, with his last girl. A woman of sculptural body, worked in the gym and retouched by plastic surgeons.
"The brothers spent part of the money obtained in the robberies in aesthetic operations," say sources close to the case, who noted the persistent desire of some of the band members to improve their appearance.
Planned kidnapping
Knowing that they were being watched by the security forces did not accuse them and the suspects were gathering, supposedly to plan new robberies, on a farm in Cártama on behalf of their father. A land in which Rafael, one of the brothers, had settled down and that would be key in the outcome of the investigation.
The López López took different paths each time they moved to this property and took the usual precautions when they met. To the point that the agents who followed them could not bet in the immediate vicinity without running the risk of being detected and often limited themselves to capture some image from a moving car.
However, this did not prevent investigators from knowing their plans and being forced to precipitate arrests. According to those responsible for the case, the Daltons were going to go a step further in their criminal trajectory and their next suit included the kidnapping of the director of a bank branch of the Malaga capital.
The police operation avoided him and made possible the arrest of three of the brothers, since the fourth seems to have smitten and has abandoned his criminal career. A drop that was compensated with other family members and their environment, who allegedly played other roles related to concealment and laundering.
But if those responsible for the case expected any kind of collaboration, they were wrong. When David, Antonio Jesús and Rafael were handcuffed in front of the investigators, they knew they were not going to get anything out of them. "Quiet, polite and chastened," recalls an agent when asked to take a picture of the moment. Impertérritos even when, after three hours talking with one of the agents, the ringleader's girlfriend confessed where a valuable Patek Philippe watch was that her partner had given her and that it came from one of the robberies.
Nor did they need to sing. It was more a matter of procedure, since for months they had collected numerous evidence to send the Daltons back to prison. And this time, for a long season: "They play between ten and twelve years."
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