The Civil Guard has arrested 36 people and is investigating six others for the theft of 34,215 meters of copper cable, primarily in the province of Ávila. The material is estimated to be worth two million euros and the individuals involved – who have been arrested in Ávila as well as in Valladolid, Córdoba, and Sevilla – are accused of crimes including robbery, damage, arson, and belonging to a criminal group. The network members coordinated to steal telephone cables, process them to extract the copper, and then sell it. Due to the high value of copper, these types of thefts have multiplied in recent years, especially in remote or rural areas that are difficult to track or detect.
The investigation began in the summer of 2023 after several copper thefts were reported in various parts of the province of Ávila. Officers participating in a surveillance operation caught two individuals cutting telephone lines along the national road 110 in Padiernos (Ávila). They were arrested and 870 kilos of copper cable were seized. Another patrol also caught two individuals cutting copper wiring in another area not far from Padiernos. The officers continued working on the case and soon discovered where the criminals were burning the cable to access the material; they caught three people in the act of burning cable in Vicolozano (Ávila). These individuals are also responsible for violating environmental regulations, as their activities could have led to a forest fire.
The Civil Guard has outlined the criminal group’s strategy: first, they would locate desirable areas for theft, where telephone line poles ran parallel to secondary roads. They would then assign the theft to several individuals, organize and divide them into groups, who would operate in vans, especially at night, to deploy tools such as pruning shears and saws to cut hundreds of meters of cable. Once the theft was completed, other members would cut the cable into two-meter blocks for processing and transport, dividing it among vehicles. After the robbery, they would go to remote areas to burn the cable insulation and retrieve the copper. The illegally obtained material would end up with intermediaries or scrap yards in cahoots with the criminal group, who knowingly purchased it and circulated it in the regular market.
The gang committed 38 thefts in Ávila alone, and the Civil Guard managed to recover 13,108 kilos of copper. The sub-delegate of the Government in Ávila, Fernando Galeano; the lieutenant colonel Gustavo Dorda; and the captain chief of the judicial police unit of the Ávila’s headquarters, Juan José Vallejo, briefed the operation. They revealed that the criminal network was based in Córdoba and emphasized the recent increase in copper thefts following the rise in metal prices. Dorda highlighted the presence of two organized groups detected thanks to night patrols tasked with monitoring roads where these incidents were expected to occur.
The criminals did not originate from Ávila; the investigation led to Torrejón de Ardoz (Madrid) and then to Córdoba and Écija (Sevilla). Vallejo explained that the thieves traveled from Madrid and Córdoba to Ávila during the day to scout locations to assault the cables and remote areas to burn the protective plastic. “Once the area was identified, they looked for escape routes and waited for nightfall.” On one occasion, the gang accidentally started a small fire while burning the cable, which was extinguished by firefighters. They were eventually caught by the guards after repeatedly returning to the same burning spots. The group from Córdoba brought trucks to carry larger loads and conduct thefts of up to 4,000 kilos of copper.
