The National Police, in collaboration with the Local Police of Santa Coloma de Gramenet (Barcelones Nord), has arrested two people in this town as responsible for the following crimes: active prostitution, against the rights of foreign citizens, and against workers rights. Two brothel floors have been dismantled in which eleven citizens of Colombian, Venezuelan and Honduran origin were found who practiced prostitution in clandestine and unsanitary conditions.
The investigation began thanks to citizen collaboration, by alerting the neighbors through the City Hall, of the existence of several floors in which prostitution would be practiced. Apparently, the victims were forced to prostitute themselves in rooms with lack of ventilation and unsanitary conditions. The investigators in charge of investigating the case, after verifying the existence of a web page that advertised and offered services of a sexual nature in brothel-flats, coordinated with other Immigration Police Units, as well as with the Santa Coloma Local Police de Gramenet to carry out the appropriate inspections.
After initiating the appropriate investigative procedures to determine the veracity of such facts, it was possible to verify the existence of sexual services with clients, and that they functioned as a “call center” attending to clients’ anticipated appointments, which facilitates an exhaustive control of the activities of the people who practice prostitution by the family clan that ran the houses.
Thanks to the collaboration channels between the different police squads of different localities of the national territory, the National Police promotes and gives a forceful response to this type of scourge, eradicating the proliferation of brothel floors and hostess venues. Likewise, it proceeds to determine if there are victims in said flats who are exploited or forced to practice prostitution through the abuse of superiority, need and/or vulnerability. The Comprehensive Plan to Combat Human Trafficking for the purpose of sexual exploitation places assistance to the victim as a cornerstone.
Given the possibility of potential victims, the investigation is intensified and the comprehensive assistance and protection measures that currently protect these people are adopted. In total, eleven individualized declaration certificates were completed in relation to these facts; as well as the corresponding information records as possible victims of THB. Likewise, the Local Police of Santa Coloma filed administrative records of complaints for activities that were not allowed in each of the homes.
The investigation was led by the second group of the Central Unit for Illegal Immigration Networks and Documentary Falsifications (UCRIF) of the Provincial Immigration and Border Brigade of the Higher Police Headquarters of Catalonia, together with the Foreigners Operational Group of the Local Police Station of Sant Adrià de Besòs; and with the participation of the Local Police of Santa Coloma de Gramenet. The two detainees, once testified at the police headquarters, were released. The facts are sent to the Investigating Court in charge of Santa Coloma de Gramenet.
