The only woman on Britain's most wanted list has been arrested for allegedly being involved in money laundering worth a billion pounds, while walking her dogs in rural Catalonia, Spain, last Sunday morning.
And the British newspaper "The Independent" said that Sarah Panitzky, 47, is considered the most wanted person in the United Kingdom and was arrested - in Spain - a decade after her escape.
The newspaper added that Banitzky appeared in court last Tuesday after being held in a Spanish prison, where the United Kingdom began procedures for her extradition.
Panitzky, born in Yorkshire, was placed on Spain's National Crime Agency's most wanted fugitive list after she ran away in May 2013 during her trial for her leading role in a fraud ring.
Banitzky was convicted and sentenced in absentia to 8 years in prison.
The report indicated that the arrested laundered money through companies in Spain, Andorra and Dubai for a group that bought mobile phones abroad without value-added tax, and resold them in the United Kingdom, achieving a profit of one billion pounds.
Banitzky and her 17 co-conspirators were sentenced to 135 years in prison, all but her.
She was arrested in Santa Barbara, a hillside town near Tarragona, south of Barcelona, and was able to hide in Spain due to family ties there.
Sarah Panitzky was a fugitive for 9 years but remained on the radar of the UK and Spain authorities (National Crime Agency)
In 2015, police tracked her down at a location in the Barcelona town of Olivella, where her husband visited on weekends to supply her.
Police said an attempted arrest was thwarted while she fled and she changed her appearance, and it was noted that she severed all family ties with her family in Spain afterwards.
Investigators searched for years without success before finally obtaining evidence in February that Banitzky was hiding in Santa Barbara.
Tom Doddall, Deputy Director of the National Crime Agency, said: “Sarah Panitzky has been on the run for nearly 9 years, but she has remained on our radar. to serve her sentence in prison.
This should serve as a warning to others on the wanted list, Dowdal added, "We will not rest until you are caught, no matter how long it takes."
It is said that Panitzky grew up in a wealthy family in the village of Escrik, near Selby, North Yorkshire, and attended York Girls' College before moving to the fee-paying St Peter's School which claims to be the third oldest school in the world.
Her father Liu, a residential property developer and insurance broker, was imprisoned for four years for buying and selling council houses early for a big profit.
Simon York, director of Spain's Fraud Investigation Service, said they had helped arrest more than 60 fugitives since 2016 in connection with some of Britain's most damaging tax evasion cases.