Overview
- Police detained eleven people in coordinated operations in Madrid and Alicante and freed eleven victims, two of the detained have been remanded to pretrial custody, according to police statements released Monday.
- Investigators say two criminal groups recruited women abroad and online with false job offers, then forced them to work through debt bondage of about €10,000, daily fines and constant surveillance.
- Authorities describe severe coercion that included ritual threats linked to santería, forced drug use, threats to expose victims, and forced unprotected sex that led to lasting sexually transmitted infections and coerced pregnancies.
- One rescued victim was a 15-year-old who was forced to manage appointments and answer up to 100 client calls a day across four phones, and police found flats operating as brothels with coded door access and prepaid client vouchers.
- The cases are now formal criminal investigations and judicial proceedings, and police say the operations highlight enforcement challenges posed by dispersed apartment-based prostitution and cross-border recruitment.