RICARDO JORDÁN
Officials from the Local Immigration and Documentation Brigade of the Local Police Station of the National Police Corps of Arrecife, whose functions during controls in the Naos port of Arrecife include the investigation of those networks that favor the transport of illegal foreigners from Africa to Europe, and who use all kinds of tricks for a high price, inventing ghost companies, falsifying all kinds of documents, offering non-existent job positions, falsifying entry and exit stamps, etc., proceeded on July 4 to arrest Ramón José F..F., a 40-year-old Galician man, resident of Lugo, who the judicial authority has released on charges after being accused of a crime of Facilitating Illegal Immigration.
Along with the captain of the boat named Carmeiro and registered in Galicia, the agents of the National Police arrested another eight black men, who are now in the Guacimeta Internment Center awaiting deportation to their countries of origin, 3 of them natives of Senegal, 4 of Guinea Bissau and 1 of Guinea Conakry, for violation of the Immigration Law 8/2000. The undocumented immigrants, taking advantage of the excuse of a boat breakdown to arrive at the port of Arrecife, were being transported irregularly from the Mauritanian dock of Noadibou to that of Arrecife, when in principle their route dictated Galicia as their destination.
Police sources told lavozdelanzarote.com today that what raised the suspicions of the officials at the Arrecife dock upon the arrival of the boat was its lack of consignee as well as its lack of cargo and fishing gear on board.
Although the Police had not acted in this type of matter for some time as it is not very common in Lanzarote, the agents who, instructed in the matter, are aware that there are mafias that transport illegal immigrants and that they normally use fishing boats to bring African citizens to Europe, passing them off as sailors, immediately requested documentation from the skipper and proceeded to interrogate the alleged sailors.
Crew without a trade
It was then when, after verifying various irregularities among the documents of the fishing boat, such as that neither the captain nor his eight crew members were registered in the relevant books, and that there was no sailor's card, the contradictions among those questioned began to arise. Police sources informed lavozdelanzarote.com that, after the statements, the police verified that three of the alleged sailors had claimed to work in the kitchen, but none had any idea of the culinary art, with the aggravating factor that they were not traveling with food for 9 people and a route to. The sources added that neither was the reason for the breakdown clear after the interviews, that the remaining alleged mechanics did not know the engine of the boat or its color and that as sailors they did not even know the number of tides there are per day.
Once it was clarified that the function of 8 of the 9 crew members, among whom only one knew the seafaring, was not to work on the boat, and it was verified that their arrival in Arrecife had not been communicated either to the Port Authority of Las Palmas or to the San Ginés Guild, lacking therefore a consignee in port, the agents observed the non-existence of fishing gear and verified that the boat was not carrying any cargo. Then they saw more than clearly that the fishing boat had diverted its route to unload the irregulars in Arrecife and then continue to Galicia with fewer people. According to maritime legislation in the Fishing license, from the Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Fisheries, the documentation from Mauritanian Authorities provided by the skipper, and which had authorized the boat to fish in the last two years only with three crew members on board, did not conform to legal procedures, giving the captain the possibility of freely adding as many sailors, or not, as he wants.
After the police proceedings, the detained skipper is free on charges, accused of a crime of Facilitating Illegal Immigration, while the eight irregulars remain in the Guacimeta Internment Center, awaiting deportation to their countries of origin after violating the Immigration Law.
