Navarra is experiencing days of controversy due to the refusal of the regional government to recognize the crimes committed by 'menas'. After starring in incidents such as the beating of the son of congressman Carlos García Adanero or the street harassment of girls in Marcilla, the behavior of these young people supervised by the Government of Navarra has captured public opinion with disparate political versions.
On the one hand, President María Chivite has defended the 'menas', assuring that there is no reason to generate social alarm, a position similar to that of the Minister of Social Rights, Carmen Maeztu, who has been reluctant to hold responsible to the collective of these crimes.
However, Enrique Maya did take a step forward to denounce the growing insecurity in some parts of the city, attributed mainly to the 'menas'. With the data from the Municipal Police in hand, the mayor of Pamplona stated that 80% of violent robberies were committed by foreigners and shielded environments such as Vuelta del Castillo, the usual place for these incidents, with night patrols.
A few words that have led him to be condemned as "xenophobic" by the municipal groups of EH Bildu, Geroa Bai and PSN, but which corroborate the different police forces that operate, not only in Pamplona but throughout Navarra.
After collecting testimonies from the different police forces that operate in our community, NAVARRA.COM has been able to confirm that during the past 2021 the 'menas' have been arrested and sentenced for carrying out crimes on at least 213 occasions.
Specifically, there is evidence of 30 arrests for robbery, 31 for theft, 28 for robbery with violence and intimidation, 28 for robbery with force, 17 for legal claims, 14 for threats, 11 for attacking law enforcement officers 11 for resistance, 11 for damage, 7 for disobedience, 5 for drug trafficking and 23 for other crimes, including 3 arrests for homicide or attempt and 2 for sexual assault.
To these data, we must add many of the 47 arrests of foreigners for robberies with violence carried out by the Municipal Police, which are not included in the previous list. Some crimes that, according to the body, have increased by 50% in the last year.
In the case of the Provincial Police, arrests exclusively of 'ores' in 2021 increased by 23% compared to 2020, reaching one in five arrests. For its part, the Municipal Police has also recorded the growth in crimes committed by this group and points out that in 2020, the year in which fewer arrests were made due to the pandemic, the only arrests that increased were people of African origin (from 75 to 127). The memory of Pamplona for the year 2021 remains to be known, but those responsible for Security point out that the increase is maintained.
This situation of continuous arrests, crimes, fights and an increase in insecurity and violence against these young people has led several police officers to denounce the situation they experience every day in their job.
"The 'menas' are the protagonists of daily attacks on working personnel, robberies, threats, consumption of narcotic substances, drug trafficking. Not to mention the daily transfers that we must make with them to health centers for Covid tests, alleged crises psychological or anxiety, contentions for being aggressive", exposes a citizen security agent of the Foral Police.
Trade union sources from this body certify that on many occasions, the members of these patrols "mortgage" their workday for the 'menas', ceasing to provide other services during those hours. In Gazólaz, they say, for example, part of the youth care center burned down as a result of a mattress that was burned in a room, after attacking the security guard, and these are events -according to different agents- that are silenced to avoid social alarm that it implies in citizenship.
“The last straw is that we have become taxi drivers for all of them. The most dangerous escape from detention centers on weekends, their managers report their disappearance to cover their backs for the crimes they will commit and when they get bored they show up at the Provincial Police offices so that we can return them in the patrol car to Marcilla, Alsasua, Gazólaz, Iturmendi, Tudela, Ilundáin", describes this police officer about another of his usual duties with these young people.
He also recounts how it is in those transfers when they talk to them, that "they boast of their impunity, of a law for minors that is a joke and they die laughing at the reprimands of juvenile prosecutors for their crimes."
"Spain is the dream paradise because they get paid without doing anything," says the agent.
The agents mention as a specific case that of a young Ecuadorian ward who went to prison, at the age of 18, for a robbery with intimidation in the Vuelta del Castillo and he is back on the street with 105 criminal records behind him.
"Our consolation is that sooner or later they end up in jail because their criminal activity has no limits. Although they leave through the back door in many cases since justice has a serious problem with the application of rules that are already very lax”, exposes the citizen security agent.
Trade union sources indicate that they not only commit very serious crimes -robbery with violence, sexual assaults- but that they also dispute violently among themselves over economic and religious issues, fights between Latino gangs against those from the East, Dominicans against North Africans...
“In Zizur Mayor it is common for them to meet up to hit each other, we have seized baseball bats, butterfly knives, objects capable of killing a person”, reproduces a Provincial Police agent. In that town, it was necessary to act forcefully and a house was closed due to the increase in crime and problems with the neighbors.
The discourse of an increase in crimes by 'menas' and the extreme situation of the agents is repeated in the National Police force. As indicated by their union, the interventions are continuous as well as the lack of respect. Thefts, assaults, possession of hashish and marijuana are just some of the crimes committed by the around 180 'menas' residing in Navarra.
This police force also points out that the situation, although it has worsened substantially in the last year, is not new and that in 2019 they went to the Parliament of Navarra warning of a new type of violence and crimes associated with 'menas' , of which until then there was hardly any knowledge and which began to cause concern in those years.
“We warned that the violence and crimes committed by this group of young people were going to grow and it has been. And we are convinced that it will still go further. The feeling we have is that until something big happens, it will not stop ”, they explain from their union.
In SUP they also speak that in recent months they have noticed a greater number of actions and that the current measures do not deter, in the long run, the crimes of these 'menas' and 'jenas'.
“The patrol around Vuelta del Castillo is working but they will find other places. After the confinement they were in Yamaguchi, last summer in the surroundings of the Aranzadi swimming pools. It is a matter of time before they settle in another place”, they point out.
One of the demands that all the police forces insist on is that they stop hiding the crimes committed by 'menas', that they accept the situation and seek solutions to the growing problems.
This is what, for example, the Provincial Police union sources indicate: “Politicians hide the problem or lie because of their incapacity and above all because of the kindness that prevails. When it is said that those who commit crimes are 85% Spanish... it is not said that the majority are of foreign origin, nor that some lawyers from well-known associations, far from helping them, actually smear them with all the rights that assist them and tricks legal to get away with it.
They add that the "last straw" is classifying them as 'ores' by being undocumented based on the testimony of their age, "when it is plain to see that many of them are over 18 years of age."
On behalf of the National Police union, they denounce that the political class "focuses on the fact that they are no longer 'menas' because they are of legal age" but the reality is that "they are under the protection of the Government of Navarra and the crimes of these young people, whether or not they are of legal age, does not stop going up”.
A problem that, from his point of view, can only be eradicated if it is tackled at the base, through education.
"What happens is that many of these young people have no aspirations or nothing to lose and they dedicate themselves to wandering and committing crimes," they state.
Of all the problems, the security forces highlight above all the violence carried out by members of this group. They give as an example the intervention of the National Police in the Plaza del Castillo in which a young man of Moroccan origin seriously injured himself when several agents proceeded to arrest him for having stolen a wallet.
"The most dangerous are the North Africans, many of them are armed to intimidate their victims and some, who do not hesitate to attack the police, have around a hundred criminal records, all citizen security patrolmen know them, no matter the color of the uniform", they point out.*
For this reason, it is also worrying that they transfer this violence to the victims of their robberies or thefts.
“They look for young kids who go alone or in pairs and assault them in groups of about ten people. They steal mostly clothes, wireless headphones, money and do not hesitate to use violence. Mobile phones do not usually take it because of the location issue, ”say Municipal Police sources.
Despite the refusal of many politicians to acknowledge the problem, the police forces agree that there should be total transparency about this situation.
“No matter how much those in charge say, the population knows what's up. He knows that it is better to avoid the Vuelta del Castillo or change the street if you meet these groups but there are those who do not want to see it, ”says the SUP spokesman, who adds that it is the general feeling of the rest of the bodies.
In the case of the Provincial Police, they emphasize not only the alarming situation of citizens but also that of the police. According to union sources, in 2021 eleven colleagues were on leave from work when they were injured by 'men' who attacked them and were arrested, to which innumerable damages and injuries in other administrative interventions should be added.
"A misfortune will end up happening and then we will throw our hands up in our heads," says an agent whose work clashes with the interest of the Chivite government in silencing a reality that citizens experience daily on the street.
