A WOMAN has been arrested in connection with 12 muggings involving 'hugging' her victims in the street, each of them hundreds of kilometres apart.
The 27-year-old, said to be a Romanian national, was caught in Alicante as a result of four court arrest warrants and eight police search orders.
She mugged pedestrians, mainly middle-aged and elderly people, in Sagunto (Valencia province), Maspalomas, on the island of Gran Canaria, and in the province of Guadalajara in Castilla-La Mancha, National Police reveal.
Her modus operandi is one that is becoming well-known in public: approaching passers-by out of the blue and behaving in an extremely tactile and affectionate manner, hugging and kissing them, during which she would slip off their watches and jewellery and steal their wallets.
On five of the 12 occasions, where the victim put up resistance, she would become violent in an attempt to make off with their valuables.
Although it is only considered proven that she carried out muggings in Maspalomas, Sagunto and Guadalajara, the accused is also wanted by courts in Zaragoza, Aragón; Valencia, and in Balaguer in the province of Lleida, Catalunya.
She was thought to have been living temporarily in the east-coast city of Alicante and, after successfully tracing her there and identifying her, she was taken into custody.
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