The Mossos d’Esquadra have spent years x-raying the thieves who operate in Barcelona and who generate a high sense of insecurity. The analysis of the data for 2022 draws a clear profile: they are men, young people, between 18 and 25 years old, with a hefty curriculum of arrests and who act out of opportunism, alone, in the evening, in the center of the city. , against a single victim and commit either theft or violent robbery. The Catalan police have drawn up a list with 283 multiple repeat offenders based on data from last year, as they explained at a press conference. All of them add up to 2,270 arrests (an average of eight per person) and 5,600 criminal acts (about twenty each). Only nine are women.
On the podium of the group of 300 multi-recidivists, the most active accumulates 25 arrests, the second, 24, another two have been arrested 23 times, and a fifth, 22. Only two of them currently remain in preventive detention. Of the total number of those arrested for violent robberies by the Catalan police, 10% go to jail. The figures also indicate that last year thefts in the city decreased by 26% (260 per day) and violent robberies on the street by 13% (30) compared to 2019. The latter are the ones that generate the greatest feeling of insecurity, despite the fact that 97% did not use weapons, and 74% ended without injuries.
The Catalan police have detected two types of thieves. The most common is the “opportunistic” criminal, in the words of the chief commissioner of Barcelona, Marta Fernández. People who live in Barcelona and who, before acting, assess the “risk and benefit” of the action they are going to commit. They also take into account the ease of reselling it later. Some of them also commit robberies in establishments, and usually live in premises or occupied flats (the police have detected 35). The second, less common type, is organized crime: people who expressly travel to the Catalan city to commit crimes, especially taking advantage of fairs, festivals and other events. In the list of multiple repeat offenders, 26 have records in other countries for similar crimes.
The researchers have also detected a mix between both types of thieves, which occurs above all in the theft of luxury watches, as explained by the head of the Barcelona investigation, Inspector Josep Naharro. In 2019, these types of robberies were essentially carried out by organized crime. In 2022, the Catalan police have verified that these more structured organizations have “assigned part of the risk” to the local thief, who is the one who commits the violent robbery, while transportation and sale continue to remain in the hands of the most specialized thief. In this type of case, the Mossos insist, the most important thing is to attack the receiver to stop some robberies that represent 7% of the total.
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