Spain: Ex-fraud chief arrested after €20m was found in walls of his house

As part of an investigation into the country’s largest-ever cocaine bust, a top Spanish police officers has been arrested in connection with €20m (£17m) found hidden in the walls of his house.

Óscar Sánchez Gil served as the head of the fraud and anti-money laundering division of Spain’s national police force in Madrid until recently. He was arrested last week, alongside 15 other people, including his romantic partner, who is also a police officer in the Madrid region, according to police source.

During the raid, police found the €20m, in cash, hidden in the walls and ceilings of the couple’s home in Alcalá de Henares, a town of about 195,000 inhabitants located 18 miles (30km) east of the Spanish capital.

The police source also revealed that €1m was found by officers in his office, hidden in two locked cupboards, in bills of €50-500.

The Guardian reported that the couple have been charged with drug trafficking, money-laundering, corruption and membership of a criminal organisation after last week appearing before a Madrid court, which remanded them in custody, a judicial source said.

Spanish media said the arrests were linked to the seizure last month of 13 tonnes of cocaine that arrived in the southern port of Algeciras from Ecuador’s largest city Guayaquil – a drug-trafficking hub – hidden among crates of bananas.

Police said the drug bust – which they only announced last week – is the largest-ever haul of cocaine in Spain and “one of the largest seizures in the world”.

The container was destined for a Spanish importer based in the south-eastern coastal town of Alicante “who had been receiving large quantities of fruit imported from Ecuador for years”, the authorities said.

Police searched several homes and offices in Madrid and Alicante after the cocaine seizure. These operations uncovered links between the importer and Sánchez Gil, according to Spanish media reports.

He was already under suspicion by his colleagues who had tapped his phone, daily newspaper El Mundo reported.

The father-of-three, who is in his 40s and lives in a brick house protected by metal gates, is suspected of having worked for the drug traffickers for “at least five years”, a source told the newspaper.