The news of an impressive illegal arms bust in the province makes a change from busting drug cartels and illegal plantations.
The discovery of a 3-level, underground, shooting range in the west of the province made the international news because it’s not every day that the police find such an elaborate set up, buried underground.
Officers from the Policía Nacional and the Guardia Civil carried out raids in Loja, Moraleda de Zafayona and the city of Granada; the underground installations were in the conflictive, Almanjáyar area of the city but illegal firearms were also stored in those other locations mentioned.
The underground, shooting gallery was excavated by hand using everyday tools so as not to raise suspicion and at that depth people living nearby couldn’t hear the shots. The shooting gallery was used to test out the illegal firearms before selling them on to drug runners and other criminal gangs.
In addition, three people have been arrested for the commission of alleged crimes of illegal possession of weapons, storage of weapons of war and belonging to criminal organization.
Officers confiscated three assault rifles, one submachine gun, six side arms, one semi-automatic shotgun, one bulletproof vest, two imitation pistols, several, high-capacity magazines for assault rifles, submachine guns and pistols and… an exploding partridge in a pear tree… OK, we made up the last one.
Most of the weapons were found buried on shanty-town land in the Almanjáyar area, along with a large amount of ammunition of different calibers. Police had already been keeping an eye on this land because people with legal and ilegal firearms came to use it for shooting practice — an open secret in the area.
Customers for these illegal weapons paid between 6,000 and 7,000 for a pistol and 10,000 for an assault rifle. Transactions were made via safe messaging applications, probably of the kind used by the Trump Administration to plan military attacks…
Firstly, potential customer were sent videos of the weapons being tested and if it progressed from there then the customer was brought to the underground shooting gallery. All this was done using tight security (but not tight enough) which made the police’s investigation work much harder.
(News: Granada, Andalucia)
Keywords: Underground Shooting Gallery, Illegal Arms, Assault Rifles, High-Capacity Magazines, Loja, Almanjaya, Moraleda de Zafaraya
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