Migrants Seized, Held captive in a house in Comiso, freed after ransom Paid, 5 arrests

By meridionews.it

15/05/2015

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Foreign taken out of the centers, with the promise of being taken to the North Italy. Instead they were imprisoned in Ragusa and released after the family had paid a ransom of 200 euro. For those arrested are accused of kidnapping and smuggling of migrants.

They were arrested at five o’clock this morning. The eldest is a man of Moroccan nationality, Nasrllah Fouad , 43, the other four are younger: Two Eritreans, Abe Nagawo and Mahammed Nur Mohammed Jimie , Ethiopian, Ayalew Yosef and the Pakistani Rafique Junaid , all between 26 and 28 years. Together they formed a group that seized migrants and released them after payment of a ransom of two hundred euro . The time now is accused of kidnapping of people and smuggling of migrants .

The investigation began by looking for a migrant child of Eritrean origin. The girl had been received in a structure of Syracuse , where he lived. Monday a relative of the girl, who lives abroad, contacted the police: she had received a telephone call from the young man, who demanded a payment of two hundred euro in a prepaid card. It was the ransom demand so that he might be freed. The police, after the complaint, were put on his trail.

Like her, men and women of Eritrean origin are substantial part of migration flow departing from the African continent. Eritrea, a country ruled by the dictator Isaias Afeweki , provides for the mandatory military conscription and permanent – in life – for both men and women. Eritrean criminal organizations are also active in the Italian territory for years. Dealing with illegal repatriations, kidnappings and violence against fellow citizens. Also conspicuous are the Eritrean community in northern European countries, where in many require and obtain asylum.

By working together, the investigators of Siracusa and Ragusa found the actions of the criminal gang, which used repeatedly strategy: approaching migrants outside the centers of Siracusa and proposed able to take them in northern Italy, in Milan , from where they could reach other European countries with greater ease and a few hundred euro.

The migrants were instead brought in a van in a house in Via Vittorio Veneto in Comiso , they rented under a contract of one of the gang members, who were in possession of a valid permit . Inside the house where they were kidnapped migrants, the police, after surgery, they found only bread and water as food and mattresses is not sufficient for the number of inmates. Until relatives, contacted after the abduction, did not pay the ransom, migrants remained in hostage . Only after they were released and escorted to the bus station in Dubrovnik, where they were boarded on the means to Milan, so that they could finally reach.

To discover them was enough to put under examination the flow of migrants to the square Zama . A group of Eritreans were departing from Dubrovnik to the chief town of Lombardy. The officers recognized the young through the photos provided by the family and intervened, arresting four of the five members of the organization. The testimony of the girl then provided the information necessary to formalize the accusation against them and to recognize the last component, which was stopped, still unaware of the arrest of accomplices, on his return in the home as a prison. The five men are now in the home district of Ragusa