KEY POINTS:
Known as "El Solitario", Spain's most wanted man, suspected of robbing 31 banks and killing three men over 14 years, was finally caught by police yesterday in the Portuguese coastal town of Figuera da Foz.
The serial bankrobber, nicknamed "The Loner" for his habit of operating without accomplices, owed his long criminal career to a succession of crude but effective disguises, which enabled him to foil the scrutiny of security cameras.
Identified for the first time yesterday as Jaime Gimenez Arce, 56, he was armed and carrying items of disguise when detained in Portugal, where he apparently planned to carry out his next attack. That marked a departure for the man who has robbed banks in towns throughout Spain.
El Solitario's modus operandi was always the same: he would acquaint himself thoroughly with his chosen bank's security procedures and weak points. Then, disguised with a dark wig and false beard, armed with a pistol, a revolver or a machinegun, and with his fingertips covered with sticky tape to avoid leaving prints, he approached the counter just before lunchtime on Thursday or Friday when the tills were stuffed with cash.
He targeted bank branches in small towns, calculated to the second how long his operation could take before police would respond, and treated cashiers politely. Recently he walked with a limp, and carried a metal crutch that diverted attention when metal detectors registered the arms hidden beneath his clothes.
He took only what was in the till, which kept him going till his next bank visit. His biggest haul was €108,000, his smallest €835. His total haul was €600,000.
Never identified throughout his criminal career, police described El Solitario as bald, of medium height and thin. But his victims behind the counter always described a bulky man, hairy of head and face. He is suspected of murdering two paramilitary civil guardsmen in Castejon in Navarra in June 2004, who spotted him without his disguise and could have identified him, and a local policeman in May 2000 after he pulled off a bank raid in Vall D'Uixo, near Castellon.
He was a highly skilled marksman, which suggested he had received military training. Police suspected he was a former member of the Army or security services, but trawled expelled "bad apples" without success.
- INDEPENDENT
