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One of Britain’s most wanted criminals, suspected of distributing large quantities of Class A drugs in southwest England, has been allowed to roam free by Portuguese authorities despite a British extradition request. rice field.
Alex Male, 30, was arrested at Lisbon airport on April 30 on suspicion of using a fake passport.
He was denied entry into Turkey due to alleged false documents and immediately flew to Portugal.
However, a spokesman for the UK’s National Crime Agency (NCA) told The Epoch Times in an email: Country.
He added: British law enforcement is determined to find fugitives and bring them to justice. “
Habeas corpus is Latin for “you will receive the body” and is the legal term for when a court presents a person in custody and orders him to be charged or released.
Details of what led to his release are not clear at this time, but it will be a major blow to the NCA, which announced his arrest as a “great outcome” earlier this year.
A man from the town of Weston-super-Mare, near Bristol, was wanted as part of a Southwest Regional Organized Crime Unit investigation into drug supplies.
He was one of many arrested as part of the NCA’s Operation Venetic for using EncroChat, an encrypted communications platform, to conduct criminal activities.
In May, the NCA said the man was based at the Spanish resort of Marbella, and when he was arrested, NCA international liaison officer Phil Robinson said: But he underestimated the vigilance and expertise of the Turkish border police that enabled the Portuguese authorities to act.”
Robinson adds: I am glad he was arrested as he is wanted in connection with a dangerous crime that has had a devastating impact on the community. “
At one point, 50,000 people (over 9,000 in the UK) used EncroChat to send and receive secure messages.
But in March 2020, French police used malware in the form of a software update to breach EncroChat’s network, hosted on servers in the town of Roubaix in northern France, and compromised tens of thousands of encrypted chats. Invaded the message.
The message was shared with the UK’s NCA, which launched Operation Venetic, claiming it had identified hundreds of criminals who were dealing drugs and guns and plotting murder.
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Chris Summers is a UK-based journalist with a wide range of national coverage, with a particular interest in crime, police and law.
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