ON a remote and lonely Costa Blanca road, a ten-metre trail of blood on the tarmac led to the body of John George.
Whoever killed the Belfast father-of-two was in a hurry, his body dragged off a rural road and left under a lemon tree without any attempt to dig a shallow grave.
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Blood and police forensic markings on the Costa Blanca where the badly decomposed body of missing Belfast man John George was found Credit: Doug Seeburg
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The killing of John George was the latest in an explosion of violence in Spain’s CostasCredit: Pacemaker
When I visited the scene on Thursday – two days after the 37-year-old’s remains were discovered – the arrows police had placed next to the bloodstains were still in place.
John’s badly decomposed body was found in a citrus grove on the outskirts of the luxury expat enclave of Rojales three weeks after he went missing on a sunny holiday.
His killing is part of an explosion of violence in Spain’s Costas in which another bullet-riddled body was found in Rojales a few days after the disappearance of Northern Irishman John. The incidents are not believed to be related.
Further west, on the Costa del Sol, there was more bloody mayhem, with four shootings over the Christmas period at resorts popular with British tourists.
A man was shot in the head in Fuengirola in December.
On Christmas Eve, a German was shot and injured near the Cristamar shopping center in Puerto Banus, Switzerland.
Meanwhile, on Boxing Day, two Swedes — suspected of being drug dealers — were shot with assault rifles in Benalmadena.
Settle disputes by torture and execution
In another attack on January 2, also in Puerto Banus, a former German Hells Angel was shot in the groin.
The violence is believed to be linked to the lucrative drug trade.
Marbella’s chief prosecutor, Julio Martinez Carazo, said last year that the local drug trade was creating “reckless delinquency – delinquency without scruples”.
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Costas has long been a sunny place for shady people.
When the extradition treaty between Britain and Spain expired in 1978, the coast here became a safe haven for the elite of the British underworld, earning it the nickname Costa Del Crime.
It was immortalized in the 2000 film Sexy Beast, with Ray Winstone playing an out-of-shape bank robber who is coaxed out of retirement for one last job.
Barbara Windsor’s ex-husband Ronnie Knight — who fled to Fuengirola in 1984 after his brother John was arrested for the Security Express warehouse robbery last year — helped popularize the area among the British underworld.
Another who was attracted to the flashy lifestyle was the Great Train Robber Charlie Wilson.
He was found murdered in his house in Marbella in 1990.
Today, the Costas are a drug highway and clearing house, where a new, sadistic breed of ultra-violent criminals settle disputes by torture and execution.
Mobsters party with hordes of unsuspecting tourists, lured by the pleasant temperatures, golden sands and screaming hotpots of Marbella and Benidorm.
And their brutal methods sometimes affect those who came to Costas for a peaceful life.
While visiting the site in Rojales where John’s body was found this week, I encountered a posh expat community of British, Irish and Scandinavian retirees enjoying drinks by their pools as temperatures dropped to 20 degrees.
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Sun reporter Oliver Harvey visited the Rojalles site where John George’s body was discovered Credit: Doug Seeburg
Green parrots flutter between tall palm trees above £250,000 pastel-hued luxury villas as the sun glints on the nearby Mediterranean.
But if we scratch the surface, this paradise has a darker side.
John George is the second murder victim to be discovered near the quiet villas in a few weeks.
In the early morning hours of December 17 – three days after John’s family last heard from him – a 39-year-old Lithuanian man was killed while trying to sneak into a mansion converted into a marijuana factory.
One neighbour, a 70-year-old retired gas engineer from the UK Midlands, told me: “At around 1.30am I heard gunshots coming from the villa behind my property. Everyone knew there was a cannabis farm there.
“You could smell it. Allegedly, a Lithuanian entered and tried to steal some plants. Someone shot him from the inside.”
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Police tape on the door of a mansion used as a cannabis farm in Rojales, where a Lithuanian man was shot and killed while trying to break inCredit: Doug Seeburg
Expat Paul Rowan, 52, a former funeral director from Wokingham, Berks, who also lives nearby, added: “I was alone in the house and at around 1.40am the doorbell started ringing. It was the police.
“The Lithuanian man’s girlfriend or wife – who must have been parked nearby and heard the shots – called them.”
Blue and white police tape remains taped to the weed factory door, and one of the upstairs windows is open to the weather.
Another expat, Paul, assures me that Rojales – about a 55-mile drive south of Alicante and with a population of 21,000 – is a “nice area” where people enjoy “golfing and drinking”.
As for crime in the city, the former policeman added: “Any nice place is going to have something going on.”
At nearby Edina’s Bar And Grill, owner Edina Csaszar, 46, said of the two murders nearby: “It’s really shocking for the people who live here because it’s a little scary.
“It’s nice and quiet here. Full of pensioners. Lots of English, German, Russian, Dutch. There is not much Spanish in this area.”
A popular hangout for expats, locals told me that other bars and restaurants dotted along the Costa Blanca seem to be staying open with few guests.
The British and Norwegian pensioners I spoke to could name bars and restaurants that they believe are fronts for laundered dirty money.
“There is definitely a lot of money laundering,” a British man in his seventies told me.
“There is a restaurant near me that is rarely open, and when it is, no one is there.
“They kind of work — the money moves around — but they’re not really run like a restaurant.”
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Brian Charrington senior was arrested last year at his villa in Altea, near Benidorm
Unsavory characters try to fit in with the expat community on the Costa Blanca.
In March last year, Brian Charrington Snr, British mobster from the Sexy Beast era, was arrested at his villa in Altea, near Benidorm.
The shaven-headed 68-year-old – once a car dealer in Middlesbrough – has been arrested as part of a drug-trafficking and money-laundering operation. He was later released on bail.
He is known as the Wikipedia Narco because he allegedly updated the website himself with his catalog of crimes.
A colorful 40-year criminal career awash in money and cocaine saw him serve time for drug offenses in Germany and France.
Like a James Bond villain, Charrington reportedly kept crocodiles in the pool of his Spanish villa.
Last January, three other Britons were detained in the Costa Blanca resort of Denia after a high-speed police chase led to the seizure of more than £10m of cocaine.
One of the suspects crashed into two police cars after the British seized a van from two Albanian criminals with 300 kilograms of Class A drugs.
Two Britons were in a van and a third in a car that drove ahead to warn them of police roadblocks and other potential dangers.
There is also a British presence among the major crime syndicates who have made Marbella’s trendy bars and lavish restaurants their fiefdom.
It is estimated that more than 100 criminal groups from 59 nationalities operate in the tourist haven.
These include 14 British companies, as well as the Italian mafia, the Serbian mafia and Swedish motorcycle gangs.
Such is the proliferation of multinational hoods that Marbella has been dubbed the “United Nations” of organized crime by one Spanish police officer.
Spanish journalist Nacho Carretero, whose underworld reporting was the basis of TV crime drama Marbella, said: “Once upon a time only the bosses lived here.
“But now it’s a whole organisation, including the soldiers, so you have these kids from the streets of Liverpool or Dublin. They often get into trouble for misbehaving.”
In a January 2 shooting in nearby Puerto Banus, former Hells Angel Saman Baghi, 34, was blown up three times after he alerted enemies by revealing his location on Instagram.
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German bodybuilder Angel Saman Baghi was shot three times in Puerto Banus earlier this yearCredit: Jam Press
“We are returning him home where he belongs”
The Cologne native—a pumped-up bodybuilder and former MMA fighter—posted a story showing himself on a stationary bike at Real Club Padel on January 2.
Within two hours, he was shot by a man in black gym gear as he was leaving the building.
German newspaper Bild reported: “One bullet went through his buttock and grazed his penis, another hit his anus, the third pierced his left leg.”
Miraculously, he was discharged from the hospital the same day he was admitted, despite losing a significant amount of blood.
In April, local authorities launched “Plan Marbella” in an attempt to curb crime by increasing the number of police officers.
But the latest mayhem near the city will do little to assuage the fears of law-abiding locals.
In Costa Blanca, Czech is arrested in connection with John’s murder.
The motive for the alleged murder of the father – a former boxing champion who became addicted to drugs – remains unclear.
After three weeks of searching for him, his family now has a body to mourn and a grave to lay flowers on.
Dad Billy — who was looking for his son with other relatives — said: “We’ve come for John, we’ve got John.
“Now we’re bringing him back home where he belongs.”
Another senseless victim of bloody Costas.
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Rojales is a picturesque place on the Costa Blanca that is under attack from international criminal groupsCredit: Doug Seeburg
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