The Minister of the Interior, Joan Ignasi Elena, recognized this Wednesday that in Calella (Maresme) there is a security problem, given that the municipality registers 60% more crimes than the average for Catalonia, and has opted to act with “surgery”. fine” and without “generalizing”.
This was stated in the Government control session in the Parliament, after last week the mayors of JxCat del Maresme supported the first mayor of Calella, Marc Buch, who has asked for a change in the law and courage from the institutions to that foreigners who are multiple repeat offenders can be expelled.
Elena has assured that the department has already taken measures to address the situation and has increased the number of Mossos d’Esquadra troops assigned to the Arenys de Mar police station, on which Calella depends. The councilor has demanded to differentiate between municipalities where there are problems and those where there are not, but has recognized that in some towns, such as Calella, the situation is “especially worrying, for many years.”
“When we talk about the municipalities of Alt Maresme, which depend on the Arenys de Mar police station, they have an average crime rate similar to that of the rest of the country, but when we go to a specific municipality, in this case Calella, we are above 60% of the Catalan average, and it is in these places where we have to do fine surgery and work much more from the Mossos force and from the local police forces,” the councilor indicated.
Regarding the measures adopted by his department, he has specified that the Arenys police station, on which the Calella one depends, has gone from 159 to 190 Mossos agents and that the police presence and regional support will be increased, as well as dialogue. with the city council. This statement has taken the mayors of Maresme by surprise, since it is public that the ABP of Arenys, for two years, already had 190 troops, an insufficient amount to cover Alt Maresme.
Elena has also recalled that the Government does not have powers to toughen penalties against multiple recidivism, which depends on the Penal Code, and has pointed out that the Government and ERC supported the latest modifications that were approved in the Congress of Deputies and that they will continue to do so.