A man swindled quite a few people out of their money by taking deposits on accommodation rentals in the skiiing village on Sierra Nevada.

He has since been arrested by the Guardia Civil as part of the police operation, Tec-Rentalsnow, suspected of having swindled in total some 14,000 euros between November 2021 and January this year, from eighteen different people.

The 47-year-old man, who is no stranger to the law, advertised vacancies for rentals on several web pages. He even offered parking spaces and forfaits for those interested.

Those that did book through him transferred between 540 and 2,140 euros. Then soon after receiving the money he would contact them to say that there had been an outbreak of Covid and that the Junta de Andalucía had put the building under quarantine and therefore, they would not be able to acccess their apartment. He informed them, however, that he would be returning their deposits… which he never did.

Then, a victim from Alicante placed a denuncia stating that on the 15th of November he had made a booking for an apartment for eight persons between the 31st of December and the 4th of January, as well as purchasing eight forfaits, transferring in two separate quantities 1,264 euros for the forfaits and 880 euros for the apartment.

When he turned up to collect the keys from the agreed collection point, a hostel in Pradollano (ski village), it was closed. Whilst he was there trying to find out why it was closed he found out about other people who had been duped like him.

The police investigation turned up other victims who had paid into the same bank account so it wasn’t hard to identify the person behind the scam.

If you have been the victim of a similar Internet scam, then you can contact the Guardia Civil at their specilised office for cyber crimes: Oficina Periférica de Comunicación de la Guardia Civil de Granada on the following telephone number: 958 185 419.

(News: Sierra Nevada, Granada, Andalucia)