Police Rescue Migrants Forced Into Prostitution By Drugs Gang

Police in Spain have rescued 20 migrants forced into prostitution by a drugs gang in the British holiday hotspot Marbella.

The women - mostly from South America - were lured to southern Spain with the offer of well-paid jobs, according to the police.

But when they arrived, they were forced to have "marathon" sex sessions with clients and sell them drugs, watched every minute by spy cameras.

The Spanish National Police said they had arrested 34 human trafficking suspects in a series of 14 coordinated raids around the Costa del Sol area.

A police video of one of the raids on a brothel shows some of the women being interviewed.

And officers can be seen counting wads of banknotes, including fistfuls of British currency.

Newsflash obtained a statement from the Spanish National Police on Tuesday, 4th April, saying: "The victims were controlled with a hidden system of recording cameras."

The statement continued: "The organisation forced the women to prostitute themselves during marathon days, being subjected to strong surveillance and also forced them to sell drugs among the clients."

The police said they had carried out 14 raids in Malaga, the Malaga towns of Marbella and Estepona, and the city of Algeciras in Cadiz.

They seized EUR 82,000 (GBP 72,000) in cash, 600 grammes of hashish, several doses of cocaine, a stolen vehicle, weapons, recording cameras and forged documents.

The operation - dubbed 'Muralla', or 'Wall' - began in 2021, with the authorities discovering that the trafficking gang recruited "women in vulnerable situations, in order to exploit them for work and sexually."

The authorities said that many of the victims were from Colombia and had been tricked into coming to Spain.

Then they were forced to work off 'their debt' to the gang by selling sex and drugs and had to be available to clients 24 hours a day, according to the authorities.

The police said that the network hid behind a series of front businesses to hide their activities, including "several vehicle repair and scrapping businesses located between Malaga and Algeciras."