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CRIME

Suspects in politician’s murder held without bail

The mother and daughter pair being held over Monday's murder of Spanish politician Isabel Carrasco have been remanded in custody without bail.

Suspects in politician's murder held without bail
Loreto Carrasco (2nd R), daughter of late Leon provincial council chief Isabel Carrasco arrives for the funeral of her mother at the Cathedral of León on Tuesday. Photo: Uly Martin/AFP

The two women have been transferred to the Mansilla de las Mulas prison near the city of León where Carrasco, Spain's 20 minutos newspaper reported.

They have also been placed on suicide watch, according to Spanish news agency Efe. 

The mother, María Montserrat González Fernández, on Wednesday confessed to firing the bullets the killed the politician. She said she had done so because of a "personal grudge" after her daughter lost a wage dispute with the council Carrasco oversaw.

Police on Wednesday said the pair had planned the murder, doing practice runs up to five times, Spain's El País newspaper reported.

A third person — a policewoman and friend of the daughter — was also detained after she handed in a bag contained the murder weapon to authorities.

She denies knowing what was inside the bag, but police are questioning her involvement given she waited some 24 hours before handing in the bag.

Monday's killing has shocked Spain, with Prime Minister Marian Rajoy decrying it as a "wretched crime".

On Tuesday, mourning relatives wept outside a public building where Carrasco's body lay in state, attended by Rajoy and other leading politicians, while thousands of people filed past the politican's casket to pay their final respects.

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CRIME

Spain seizes 1.8 tonnes of Sinaloa Cartel’s crystal meth

Spanish police said Thursday they had seized 1,800 kilos of crystal meth that Mexico's Sinaloa Cartel was trying to sell in Europe, the country's "biggest-ever seizure" of the narcotic.

Spain seizes 1.8 tonnes of Sinaloa Cartel's crystal meth

Police arrested five people during the raid in the eastern Alicante province, one of them a Mexican running the cartel’s Spanish operation, a statement said.

“This is the biggest-ever seizure of crystal meth in Spain and the second largest in Europe,” Antonio Martinez Duarte, head of the police’s drug trafficking and organised crime unit, told reporters.

“Among those arrested is a Mexican citizen linked to the Sinaloa Cartel,” he added.

READ ALSO: What are the penalties for drug possession in Spain?

He did not give his name but indicated the suspect was responsible for receiving the narcotics in Spain then distributing them within Europe.

The Sinaloa Cartel is one of Mexico’s oldest, largest and most violent criminal groups whose influence remains strong despite the arrest of its founder Joaquin ‘El Chapo’ Guzman and his son.

Both have been extradited to and jailed in the United States.

During the operation, police also detained three Spaniards and a Romanian, seizing five cars, documents, a weapon and cash.

But police believe it was a one-off trafficking operation and that “Mexican organisations are not permanently based” in Spain, Martinez Duarte said.

“These organisations send a trusted person who carries out the operation in line with their interests” and once that is over, he goes back home, he explained.

The seized narcotics had been due to be shipped to central Europe.

Although Spain is one of the main drug gateways to Europe, seizures of synthetic narcotics are uncommon as most traffickers usually deal in cannabis and cocaine.

READ ALSO: Why is Spain’s Europe’s cocaine gateway?

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