Argentine "Sapo" arrested in Málaga, sought for cloned card fraud
Facundo Ciarlo, alias "Sapo", was arrested in Spain following an investigation by the Buenos Aires City Police. Extradition proceedings to Argentina have been initiated.
Argentine fugitive "Sapo" captured in Málaga after social media tracking
Facundo Ciarlo (52), known in judicial circles as "the Sapo", was arrested on Friday in the Spanish city of Málaga whilst driving a Jeep Renegade along Calle Héroe de Sostoa at number 100, in the Huelin neighbourhood. According to clarin.com, the capture was the result of an investigation coordinated between the Arrests and Fugitives Division of the Buenos Aires City Police and the Investigation and Protection Group (GIP) of the Málaga police.
Argentine authorities had requested Ciarlo's location in late May of this year, as he was being investigated in a new case involving fraud. The Specialist Unit for Complex Criminal Investigation (UFECRI), headed by José María Campagnoli, and the National Criminal and Correctional Court No. 9 under judge Martín Sebastián Peluso—Office 108 of Diego Andrés Villanueva—requested the search for the accused.
Investigators tracked Ciarlo's Facebook profile. The IP address associated with his logins to the platform, obtained through a request to the service provider, located the logins in Málaga, the city to which the suspect had fled as the courts advanced against him. With that information, Argentine courts requested his international capture through Interpol, and the security forces of both countries maintained constant communication until the arrest was completed. Ciarlo was held in local police facilities, and extradition proceedings to Argentina were reported to have begun.
A life of luxury built on fraud
On his social media, Ciarlo presented himself as a cosmopolitan man: photographs at the Eiffel Tower on Valentine's Day, family trips to Rome and dinners at restaurants in Spain made up his public profile. He also appeared in images alongside Diego Maradona, businessman Ricardo Fort and Bono, leader of the band U2.
He owned a company called "The Frog Travel", through which, according to the investigation, he committed fraud exceeding 10 million pesos. His modus operandi was consistent: he would purchase travel packages and tickets using cloned or duplicate cards belonging to others, and resell them through his travel agency. In the most recent case, he is accused of purchasing a ticket to Málaga and five others to Cancún, according to sources from the investigation told to clarin.com.
The accused was a fan of high-end automobiles. At the time of a previous arrest in 2015, in the town of 9 de Julio, police found diamonds, 100,000 pesos, two forged passports, mobile phones and electronic devices inside his vehicle.
Previous convictions and an episode at the Russia World Cup
Ciarlo's criminal history is extensive. In 2016 he was sentenced to three years in prison for criminal association and fraud by the Chubut courts, following a report from a ship's captain who detected fraudulent purchases using his credit card totalling 100,000 pesos from that year, intended for tickets and tourist packages for subsequent resale. The Madryn prosecutor's office requested reports from Aerolíneas Argentinas, and from there it emerged that some of those tickets had been purchased by Ciarlo. The rock band La Renga had also reported him for fraud.
In a telephone intercept that was part of the 2015 case file, "Sapo" argued with one of his partners: "If you want you can leave, this is an empire that I built, it's mine," he told him.
In 2018, despite being on conditional liberty and having a prohibition on leaving the country issued by the Chubut courts, Ciarlo travelled to Russia for the World Cup. Russian authorities detained him following the Argentina-France match, though he was later released. Before the arrest, Ciarlo himself had promoted his presence in the tournament through messages and photographs on his social media. Prior to that episode, he had made approximately fifteen trips abroad.
Source: Google News AR — Crime