A BRITISH man dressed up as a Storm Trooper could be up for the next 'Darwin award' after his botched hold-up on a Mijas hotel in August – although he has managed to escape arrest until now.
The 41-year-old, wearing the scary black-and-white helmet donned by the Star Wars 'baddies', pointed a gun at the receptionist in the Costa del Sol hotel and demanded he hand over the contents of the till – about €1,500.
But the helmet kept slipping, blocking his view, when he tried to escape.
After bumping into walls and trying to flee through the wrong door, the receptionist eventually had to tell the thief where the exit was.
And the thief had not bargained on how long it would take to load the €1,500 in cash into his rucksack, especially given that his helmet had a mind of its own – part of the CCTV footage shows him pointing the gun at his own head as he struggled with his hands full, and even putting it down on the reception desk unattended whilst he knelt on the floor to stuff the money into his backpack.
In his effort to escape – during which his obscured vision meant he got lost – the hijacker tried to approach the telephone to pull it out of its socket and prevent the receptionist calling for help.
As the robber did so, he once again left his gun unmanned on the counter for several seconds as he tried unsuccessfully to break the wire with his bare hands – a feat he eventually had to give up on and, once again, asked the receptionist to show him where the exit door was.
The Guardia Civil's aptly-named 'Operation Vader 2017' eventually led officers to identifying the clumsy culprit, who was finally arrested on Thursday this week, more than two months after the hold-up.
Once he was in custody, the Guardia Civil released a photo on its Twitter page (second picture) of Storm Troopers queuing at a cashpoint with the caption: “When you go to draw money out, be careful and watch out for 'baddies' around. And we're not exaggerating. May the Force be with you.”
Said 'baddie' turned out to be known to the police, having been arrested over a year ago in connection with several parked cars being torched.
Just after his embarrassing hotel robbery, the Briton tried to break into a villa wearing a jacket with an 'Interpol' badge, but the occupants did not believe he was an official and stopped him getting in.
A raid on his residence uncovered the Storm Trooper helmet and the Interpol jacket.
Although he did in fact make it out of the Mijas hotel with the contents of the till, the force was not with him for long – the unnamed UK national has been remanded in custody without bail.
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