The Civil Guard in Murcia has dismantled part of a criminal network that defrauded the Torrepacheco Town Hall of nearly half a million euros through a cyber scam. The operation, codenamed Financiero, led to the arrest of three suspects and the recovery of the €455,000, which was frozen before being transferred abroad.
The fraud, reported in March last year, used the “man in the middle” technique. Hackers intercepted communications between the council and its electricity supplier, imitating the company to request payment of pending invoices. Officials, believing the emails to be genuine, transferred the funds to a bank account that the criminals had set up exclusively for the scam. The fraud was exposed when the legitimate utility company later contacted the council about unpaid bills.
Investigations traced the fraudulent account to a woman in Valencia, allegedly recruited as a “money mule” in exchange for payment. Two brothers with criminal records, believed to have recruited her, were also arrested.
The suspected ringleader, a 34-year-old Romanian national, was identified as the mastermind behind the scheme. Though he has no residence in Spain, he was tracked to luxury hotels in Madrid, where he flaunted a lavish lifestyle. Spanish authorities, working with Romanian police, have issued international search and arrest warrants against him.
The Civil Guard also linked the same network to a similar fraud targeting a Portuguese pharmaceutical company. The investigation remains ongoing.
