Police Stories I
Plenty of articles on the antics of our police forces, so let’s start with the variety of policemen that we all love for their shear efficiency – the Local Police, also known as the ‘call-me-when-it’s-all-over brigade.’

One Local Policeman serving in the city of Granada managed to shoot himself in the leg, bless him. It happened at 5.45am one morning, just after he and his brothers in arms were called into action when a burglary was reported in Calle Cruz de Quirós.

Perhaps the Local Policeman had been attempting to impress members of the Policía Nacional, who had also been called to the scene. He had obviously been brandishing, really butch, his standard-issue firearm, and had most likely just blown non-existent smoke from the barrel and shoved it back into its holster when it went off… He was rushed to hospital, amidst rounds of applause from the Policía National, no doubt…

Police Stories II
Meanwhile, a Guardia-Civil policeman just received 6-year prison sentence after he was found guilty of slapping false fines on the ex-girlfriend of his brother, bless him.

The offending man’s wife is not happy, as can be expected: “He has served 20 years in the Corps, risking his life for fellow Spaniards and now they want to lock him up for six years over two driving fines. It’s disgusting!” She also complains that she has to cope by herself, with only a pension of 421 euros and on top of that she suffers from a chronic illness.

Police Stories III
A Venezuelan woman has been arrested by the Guardia Civil for robbing one of their policemen – is nothing sacred! Apparently, the 34-year-old woman used the tried-and-trusted bank-stake-out method; i.e., watching a queue in the bank to see who has withdrawn cash.

When the victim – who was off duty and wearing civvies – emerged from the bank, the woman and two accomplices allegedly followed the policeman to his car. The two women innocently stood in front of the car, stopping him from driving off, whilst the third punctured his back tyre, out of sight. They then stood aside, only to point out that he had a flat as he moved off. Then the two women, honed in the art of pick-pocketing, tried to relieve him of the money as he inspected the tyre.

Unfortunately for the Tricky Trio, he rumbled them and managed to grab one of them. The other two managed to escape.

Police Stories IV
And it’s back to the Local Police in Granada again who were attacked by a dog. The dog owner, who had ordered the dog to attack the policeman, has been given sentence of 16 months imprisonment.

But you would be wrong to believe that this was an incident only between the dog, it’s owner and a Local Policeman, because this scuffle was merely a sideshow within a large street brawl involving 70 people in Albaicín.

It all began on the first Saturday of last month around eight in the evening. Neighbours in Calle Pages had phoned to complain that around 70 people had gathered outside number 14 to hold an improvised street party, with plenty of booze, music and merriment. Two patrol cars were dispatched to check it out.

When the police arrived, they asked the gathering of young people to stop drinking and consuming drugs on a public street. Being members of the Local Police, nobody took the slightest notice.

When the police decided to insist that everybody went home, they were greeted with insults and suggestions concerning physically impossible sexual tasks.

One of the merrymakers, armed with a hungry bulldog, decided to try out something that he had obviously been hankering after for a long time – launch his Canine Kalashnikov against somebody.

Well, within moments, one of the policemen was wearing a bulldog backpack, the dog owner was fighting off an orgasm and the other policemen were reassessing the depth of their friendship towards the victim and whether it was profound enough to risk intervention.

Seconds ticked away and the other policemen came to a decision – a sort of compromise – yes, something needed doing about the victim, who was thrashing about on the floor with the dog on top of him, but that ‘somebody’ should be somebody else, so they called for reinforcements. Four more patrol cars, full with policemen were dispatched – more than an average bulldog can eat in one sitting. However, more policemen attracted more attention and the other 70 people decided to give the dog a hand – a policeman’s hand, naturally.

Finally, the dog got bored and the fight was broken up, resulting in four arrests and the bulldog dragged off to the municipal dog compound. Apparently, the policeman was no longer in its mouth by that time.

Police Stories V
For a whole week, Granada’s Local Police turned a blind eye to driving offences, as a sign of protest for the drop in the wages, brought about by the austerity cuts. Officially, the same as their counterparts in the Guardia Civil and the Policía Nacional, they are forbidden from going on strike, so they simply ‘will fail to see’ finable offences.

But it’s not only the Local Police there, but also the whole of Andalucía, supposedly, although each town or city was free to decide to join the ‘rebellion’ or not. Of course, even those that join the protest will still act in the case of the most serious offences, or one that are brought to their attention by members of the public.

With the salary cuts, a Local Policeman in Granada loses 183 euros a month, but even so, they won’t find much sympathy oozing from the ranks of the Guardia Civil, because a Local Police rookie earns more than a corporal in the Guardia Civil.

Fine-Free Tourists
The City Hall of Granada has decided to ditch any fines that are in the system involving tourists – not out of any business sense, but because it’s just not practical; i.e., they can’t reasonably expect to receive the money.

To date, many tourists that have visited the city have left with two things, photos of monuments and in many cases, driving fines for parking in areas that are reserved for residents. Hoteliers have long demanded that more care should be taken with the city’s visitor as tourism is one of the main sources of income for Granada. With that in mind, they have repeatedly pointed out that tourists are finding it ever-more difficult to find access to the hotels that are in the city centre, thanks to the complicated system whereby certain streets are restricted to residents only.

“The worst of it is that some of them who arrive by car receive a nice ‘visiting card’ in the form of a driving fine,” said a spokesman for the sector.

The Councillor for Mobility says that this is not the case because any tourist that requests to have the fine removed will obtain it, because in a broad sense, anybody staying in a hotel is technically, a resident. However, not many tourists on a tight sight-seeing agenda bother to go round to the police station to request an annulment, even if they were aware of such a possibility open to them. They normally find out that they have been fined shortly after returning home, and then complain to the hotel, who in turn complain to the City Hall.

Finally, the said councillor claims that these hotels have a direct link to a computer terminal within City Hall where they can register the number plates of their guests so that they do not get fined. However, according to the councillor, on many occasions, the hotels forget to do this.

Father or Son?
A woman, whose husband is in prison for having shot her mother, is pleading for his release because she claims that their young son was the one that pulled the trigger and that the father confessed to protect him.

“My son found the gun and went to show it to his grandmother,” claimed the wife, Isabella. The 13-year-old boy had already managed to load the magazine and the gun went off accidentally whilst it was pointing towards the woman, she claims.

The judge is not convinced, mind, because of an obvious question: why confess to a crime to protect the son out of parental love and then decide to turn round and blame him, six months later?

Again, the mother claims that at the time they didn’t realise that nothing would have happened to the boy, who, by the way, has a 33% mental incapacity. Furthermore, the forensic police found no trace of having fired the gun on the father’s hands or clothes.

Not Naughty Notary
A Public Notary has been acquitted of having raped a prostitute… That reminds me of an old joke: a prostitute is before a police sergeant at the police station and he is asking her, “If you were raped last week, why did you wait until now to report the crime,” to which she responded, “Because I didn’t know that it was rape until the cheque bounced.” Anyway, back to the article.

The notary had taken the women to a luxury hotel room in the centre of Sevilla, where the woman claims that she was forcibly raped and as a consequence of this, demanded 31,184 euros in compensation; the injuries received resulted in her not being able to work. Whilst the judge recognised that the notary did indeed take the prostitute to the said hotel room on the 18th of October 2008, the sexual injuries could not be determined: i.e., who had caused them or when they had been caused.

Unpleasant Neighbour
It’s not fun to suffer from schizophrenia; not for the person concerned, nor for the people who surround them, and in the case of a quiet ubanización in Huétor Vega, it is not only not fun, but terrifying.

“At first I felt sorry for her,” said María Pilar, but after the woman dragged her 14-year-old daughter around by her hair for wearing a miniskirt, that sentiment changed. It didn’t help the fact that the woman had also dug up Marias’ deceased husband to insult him in person, nor the incident when the violent neighbour advanced upon her with a cutter, promising that she was going to kill her.

But it is not only María Pilar who feels threatened because even social workers need a police escort when they visit her. Even the post woman was held against her will inside the house before she managed to escape.

The Mayor says that there is nothing that he can do because it is not in his hands, but in that of the health authorities. So far nothing has been done, though, despite police reports that have been sent to them.

Working for Nothing
You know when things are getting desperate when workers offer to work free of charge in order to save their jobs, which is the case of the 37 employees of Tenerías Alfa in Granada, who have offered to work every Saturday this year without pay.

The reason that their jobs are in peril is because the company wants to shut down their factory in Granada and move production to Valencia. The company did offer to find jobs for 15 of them in Valencia and the workers, who are all middle aged, accepted as long as the company paid their rental accommodation.

From the company’s point of view the transfer is necessary to save the mother plant in Valencia because the bottom has dropped out of the cured-leather business, with sales 30% down. The unions disagree, claiming that the company is healthy and that it was only 200,000 euros down in 2009, which is very little measured against the company’s total earnings.