Inside the vicious 50-strong prostitute gang who prey on boozy Brit tourists in Magaluf
British expats and holidaymakers in the Majorcan resort are falling prey to African vice girls
IT’S just gone 2am amid the gaudy neon and throbbing beats of Magaluf and a growing posse of British expats is gathering in the gloom outside Pizza Hut.
Alerted by Facebook messages, the group are soon joined by Spanish taxi drivers, club owners and bar staff eager to cast a protective watch over bleary-eyed holidaymakers staggering back to their hotels.
For this sun-drenched party town on the island of Majorca, beloved by generations of Brits — and visited by two million of us every summer — is being terrorised by a fearless gang of more than 50 Nigerian prostitutes.
When not plying sex, they mug, pickpocket and steal from tourists knowing police can do little about it.
Many African women in this position are locked into a life of vice by voodoo spells cast by their traffickers.
The West African women’s crime spree is being blamed for an alarming drop in tourist numbers in the town now dubbed Muggerluf.
Now locals and expats — some 15,505 Brits are among Majorca’s 395,192 population — have turned vigilante, taking matters into their own hands because they are sick of inaction by the authorities.
Gareth Canning, a chef, originally from Castleford, West Yorks, tells me: “These women aren’t prostitutes. They’re professional muggers.
“One offers a drunken tourist oral sex for ten euros. She leads him to an alley and six others jump out and take his wallet and cash.
“Or they just grab the crotch of a bloke walking back to his hotel with fast food in his hands, then her mates go through the guy’s pockets.
“It’s been going on for years but has got totally out of hand now. People are terrified to walk home at night.”
A Belfast COP told last weekend how he was mugged by the women as he strolled back to his hotel in the early hours with four colleagues.
“We were suddenly surrounded by a group of ten of these so-called prostitutes,” the officer, who didn’t want to be named, told the Majorca Daily Bulletin.
“Out of instinct I shouted to the lads to stuff their hands in their pockets and keep them there.
“But one of the women grabbed me between my legs. I removed a hand from my pockets to swat her away and she took my money.”
Locals say the women work in league with so-called Looky Looky men, African street hawkers peddling novelty hats, sunglasses and, in some instances, hard drugs.
Strolling along the beachfront, one beckoned me mouthing: “Weed, Charlie.” He reeled off his price list. Cannabis at 30 euros (£26) a bag, cocaine and powdered MDMA 60 euros a gram. “I’m here every night,” he said, smiling with yellowed teeth.
One local told me he often watches from his apartment as Looky Looky men steal the clothes and possessions of revellers who have gone for a dawn skinny dip or crashed out on sunbeds.
Little wonder then that tourist numbers have plummeted. This April 930,700 visited the Balearic Islands, which includes Majorca — a 6.8 per cent fall year on year.
In response Gareth, 38, set up the Facebook site Cleaning Up Magaluf — which has more than 3,000 members — to provide updates on where the prostitutes are lurking.
Last week five protesters were arrested on suspicion of hate crime following complaints of harassment from the women.
Some 100 protesters confronted about 20 African women, shouting: “The tourists are not coming because of you.”
Another of the protesters yelled: “What happens if you go back to your own countries and rob people? They slit your throats, right?”
One of the Magaluf prostitutes insisted to me: “If you do not have papers, they do not give you work, and without work we have no other choice but prostitution.”
Another Nigerian girl in her mid twenties said: “We are not here to cause problems. We don’t want to fight with locals.”
Despite the arrests, the protests have continued this week, albeit more muted.
In the early hours of Tuesday there was another stand-off between some 35 locals and ten prostitutes.
Baton-toting Guardia Civil police insisted the protesters moved back.
Tensions enflamed, several dozen locals and expats took the protests to nearby Calvia town hall on Wednesday to demand action from the mayor.
A people’s army of expats, twentysomething Spanish taxi drivers and bar workers in cut-off denim shorts faced armed Guardia Civil officers who had riot batons at their waists.
In blazing sunshine, expat Glaswegian Cathy Sinclair, 63, who runs Sinky’s pub, revealed: “No one feels safe in Magaluf now.
“I’ve seen big, well-built guys robbed. One of my waiters now carries pepper spray.
“If something isn’t done my business will fail.”
Donald and Jean Robertson, who retired to Magaluf five years ago, braved robberies and knives at their convenience store in the tough Drumchapel area of Glasgow — but are now terrified to walk the streets of their adopted home town at night.
Jean, 62, added: “We came from a rough part of Glasgow so we’re not shrinking violets.
“It was lovely and safe here once but I’m now too scared to go out on my own.”
Retired surveyor Lee Buxton, 57, originally from Southend, Essex, said: “It’s more than likely there’s mafia and pimps involved and these women are doing what they’ve got to do.”
Local cabbie Antonio, 28, said: “The tourists are here to have a few drinks and a good time. They’re robbed by these women, sometimes with pepper spray.
“Then the tourists won’t come back. These women are taking away our livelihoods.”
Calvia’s mayor Alfonso Rodríguez has pleaded with the national government for help with the problem.
Nina Parrón, the Council of Majorca’s director of equality, said vigilantism is not a “solution”.
She said the women are “victims of mafias which exploit, coerce and mistreat them” and called on police to get to the root of the problem.
She added: “The mafias demand the money. The women have no other choice but to steal.”
One local restaurant manager, 52, told me: “The police’s hands are tied. They know they’re robbing but say that unless they catch them in the act they can’t really do much.
“If they do arrest them and they are here legally, they are simply fined and let go again.”
Nigerian women are trafficked to Europe in the thousands, with many taken to a witchdoctor to pledge obedience to mafia gangsters before leaving West Africa.
The women swear an oath in a juju ceremony which can involve cutting armpit and pubic hair and taking fingernail clippings.
In 2015 a voodoo gang who used black magic to control a prostitute network was busted in Majorca.
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Police said the gang leaders performed voodoo rituals against the women’s families to ensure their cooperation. The young Nigerian women were allegedly threatened and beaten by the gang leaders.
Asked why they steal, one of the women now plaguing the strip in Magaluf said: “I haven’t any choice, I’ve got a family to feed.”
Meanwhile, in the half light of the street lamps outside Pizza Hut, Gareth insists the locals will keep up their nightly protests too.
“We’re not giving up until they’re gone,” he told me.
“The future of Magaluf depends on it.”
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