Man arrested in Valladolid for defrauding couple of €2,400 with municipal property scam
A man with 43 previous arrests deceived a married couple by posing as the owner of a municipal flat. The National Police arrested him on 25 June.
Arrested for impersonating owner of municipal flat in Valladolid
The National Police detained a man on Thursday 25 June in Valladolid accused of defrauding a married couple of €2,400 through a fraudulent rental contract for a property belonging to the city's municipal authority.
According to ABC, the victim—a woman who went on 4 June to the Complaints Office of the National Police Station in Valladolid—explained that in March she and her husband had signed a rental contract with a man who presented himself as the legitimate owner of the property.
The couple paid the man €2,400 in cash to formalise the agreement and immediately carried out renovations to the flat, which incurred an additional expense of €1,000. During that time they lived in the property without suspecting fraud.
It was only later that the married couple discovered that the property was actually owned by the municipal authority and was managed as social housing by VIVA (Valladolid Municipal Housing and Land Company). Upon confirming this, they decided to file a complaint and presented themselves to police with the signed contract, in which the identity details of the supposed owner turned out to be false.
Agents launched an investigation to determine the identity of the perpetrator. The investigation revealed that the suspect was a habitual offender against whom there was already an outstanding warrant for address verification issued by an investigating court in Fuenlabrada, and who had 43 previous police arrests on record.
The Wednesday before the arrest, a unit of uniformed officers identified the individual on the street after recognising him from other police interventions. After consulting databases and verifying the facts attributed to him, they proceeded to arrest him as the alleged perpetrator of fraud and transferred him to police facilities.
The detainee remained in custody until he was brought before a judge, following which he was released.
Source: ABC