A former Mexican beauty queen and a Romanian-Dutch accomplice were arrested in Croatia for stealing bottles of wine worth US$1.7 million in Spain after a nine-month manhunt across Europe, police said Wednesday. In a statement, the Spanish national police said that on October 27, 2021 in the western city of Caceres, 45 bottles of wine with a total value of 1.65 million euros, including a “unique” 19th-century vintage worth 310,000 euros, were released in a meticulously planned heist by the cellars of the famous hotel-restaurant El Atrio. Police investigators believe the woman, a 29-year-old Mexican woman who according to Spanish newspaper El Pais had taken part in a beauty pageant in her homeland, distracted El Atrio’s waiters by ordering room service from the Michelin-starred restaurant after the closing of his kitchen. . Meanwhile, her 47-year-old accomplice slipped into the cellar, opened it with a master key he had stolen on a previous visit and filled three backpacks with the bottles, wrapping them in hotel room towels for protection, according to the police statement. The next day, the hotel’s CCTV caught the couple, who had checked in with fake Swiss IDs, checking out at 5.30am. and fleeing on foot with no forensic evidence of their presence at the hotel, he said, leading police to initially believe an organized gang was behind the robbery. The two suspects had visited El Atrio three times before the robbery, the police statement said, and had, like many customers, been given a tour of the cellar. Among the stolen wine items was a bottle of famous French Bordeaux Chateau d’Yquem from 1806, which was of “incalculable” value, said sommelier Jose Polo, co-owner of El Atrio. “This bottle was part of my personal history, almost part of me, the history of Atrio, but also of Caceres, its citizens, wine lovers around the world,” Polo said in a letter to local media update cited by El. Pais. The two suspects fled Spain within days and were pursued for months across Europe before they were spotted by Croatian border guards crossing from Montenegro, police said. Spanish police worked with counterparts in the Netherlands, Croatia and Romania, as well as Interpol, to arrest the pair, who have not been identified pending extradition and the filing of formal charges. The stolen wine has not been recovered and the investigation is ongoing, according to Spanish media. (Reporting by Christina Thykjaer and Emma Pinedo; Editing by Inti Landauro and Mark Heinrich)
