This is the moment undercover cops brought an end to violent British criminal Mark Roscaleer’s five months on the run after nabbing him on Spain’s Costa Blanca.
Roscaleer, 36, and fellow fugitive Rodolfo Lohrmann, 59, were recaptured on Thursday at a petrol station near Alicante following a manhunt sparked after a prison breakout in Portugal last September.
The first images of their dramatic arrests were released by Spanish police yesterday – showing one of the men, believed to be Argentinian Lohrmann, trying to flee on foot after being surrounded by armed undercover cops.
He and Roscaleer were pinned to the ground face-down and their hands cuffed behind their backs a few feet apart from each other.
Cops found two guns, fake documents and more than £40,000 in euros in the Porsche Cayenne SUV they were using.
Roscaleer, 36, was one of five men including 61-year-old Lohrmann who scaled a 20ft wall with a ladder at Vale de Judeus Prison in Alcoentre near Lisbon on September 7 last year.
The criminal, originally from Runcorn in Cheshire, was serving nine years for kidnap and robbery.
He had previously tried to flee in 2019 after smothering himself in oil and trying to squeeze through the bars of his cell at another Portuguese prison.
This is the moment British fugitive Mark Roscaleer was tracked down and cuffed by Spanish police after breaking out of a Portuguese prison in September
Roscaleer had been on the run for months after successfully escaping prison on his second attempt
Police found firearms, fake documents and cash in the Porsche Cayenne SUV they had been travelling in
But he successfully fled last year as part of a mass breakout effort involving four others.
The recaptures of Roscaleer and Lohrmann mean all five prison escapees are now back behind bars.
Portuguese national Fabio Loureiro was arrested in Morocco nearly a month after he absconded.
Another Portuguese national, Fernando Ferreira, was discovered in the north of the country 48 days after he escaped and Georgian Shergili Farjiani held in Italy.
A Spanish National police spokesman said today: ‘We suspect both the fugitives recaptured in Alicante were involved in criminal activities during their time on the run, including extortion and settling of scores for a criminal organisation dedicated to drug trafficking.
‘In the car they were using officers found false documentation from Slovenia, false numberplates, an important amount of money in cash and two firearms.’
Spanish police chief Antonio Martinez Duarte said: ‘Both fugitives resisted. They are very violent men.’
Luis Neves, the head of Portugal’s Policia Judiciaria police which first went public with the arrests yesterday: ‘We’ve achieved our mission of capturing five dangerous criminals who were convicted in Portugal of committing violent crimes.’
He told a press conference in Madrid he was surprised the two wanted men were together and added: ‘There is evidence to make us think they were planning on committing robberies before fleeing to South America.’
Last September’s mass jail escape led to the resignation of Rui Abrunhosa, the Director General of the Portuguese Prison and Probation Service, after it emerged it had taken guards 40 minutes to detect what had happened.
Confirming the arrests in Spain, Portugal’s Policia Judiciaria police force said in a statement late on Thursday that the pair had been cornered after ‘persistent and uninterrupted work’ by Portuguese and Spanish authorities.
Lohrmann, they said, had a history of organised and violent crime ranging from money laundering and robbery to weapons offences and aggravated theft.
He was serving a 20-year prison sentence, the date of his first imprisonment being 16 November 2016.
Roscaleer, meanwhile, was described as having a record of ‘particularly violent crimes, such as robbery with a firearm and kidnapping’.
It added: ‘Both fugitives were subject to international arrest warrants issued by the competent judicial authority and were listed in Interpol’s red notice.’
Portugal’s Polícia Judiciária paraded mugshots of the five escapees on social media after the manhunt came to an end on Thursday
Police caught Roscaleer and fellow fugitive Rodolfo Lohrmann at a petrol station near Alicante on Thursday
Luis Neves, the head of Portugal’s judicial police (centre), said he believed the pair had been planning to commit robberies before fleeing to South America
Spanish drug squad police chief Antonio Martinez Duarte (file picture, above), described Roscaleer and Lohrmann as ‘very violent men’ who resisted arrest
Roscaleer was jailed after a trial at an Algarve court.
The convicted burglar had been accused of putting a battery cable clamp on his victim’s nipple and penis with an accomplice named as Robert George Anthony Wood, then 20.
The torture session at an abandoned house on the Algarve led to the terrified 45-year-old victim revealing where he kept thousands of pounds in cash at home.
The British pair were extradited following the October 2 2018 incident after it was discovered they were in Spain.
State prosecutors accused them of robbing the victim at gunpoint before submitting him to ‘cruel, degrading and inhuman treatment’ to try to force him into handing over more cash in an indictment submitted to Portimao Court ahead of the start of a trial which began on March 10 2020.
The guilty verdicts were made public on June 22 2020. Wood reportedly received a four-and-a-half year suspended prison sentence.
Roscaleer was jailed for four years at Chester Crown Court in March 2014 after admitting to aggravated burglary at an Ellesmere Port pub with an accomplice.
Three judges at London’s Appeal Court later increased his sentence to seven years and four months for the May 8 2012 raid.
He donned a balaclava and carried a claw hammer before ordering one of the licensees at the Gunners Arms pub to hand over the contents of the safe with the warning: ‘Get a move on or I’ll smash your skull in’. He fled with £6,300.
At the time Roscaleer was said to have 18 previous convictions for 32 offences, including possessing an offensive weapon, burglary, battery and threatening behaviour.
He sparked a police manhunt after escaping from prison in September 2015.
He gave himself up at Runcorn police station after nine days on the run. Officers had delivered seven notices to associates warning them they would be prosecuted if found to be harbouring the criminal.
In August 2019 he made headlines again by trying to escape EP Lisbon, the same prison where convicted OAP drugs smuggler Roger Clarke was then serving time after being arrested with nearly £1million of cocaine on a cruise liner.
Roscaleer was said at the time to have smashed his cell window and smothered his body in oil in a bid to squeeze through bars he planned to saw through.
Roscaleer fled Alcoentre Prison (pictured) last September as part of a mass breakout attempt
Mark Roscaleer is seen in a CCTV grab from the prison’s cameras during the escape
A UK mugshot of Mark Roscaleer after he absconded from HMP Kirkham in Lancashire in 2015
Portuguese president Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa (pictured) called the capture of all five ‘good news for justice’
Guards are understood to have thwarted his jailbreak around 11pm on August 18 2019 after catching him red-handed when they heard strange noises coming from his cell.
Portugal’s Justice Minister Rita Judice described the recapture of Roscaleer and Lohrmann overnight as ‘very gratifying.’
She said: ‘It’s very gratifying to see that, five months after the escape of five dangerous inmates from Vale de Judeus, they have all been recaptured.
‘This success is proof of the trust that citizens should have in our police.’
Portuguese president Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa said: ‘It’s good news for justice, it’s good news for the Portuguese people, because it happened much more quickly than some would have thought, and it’s good that justice works like this.’
Spanish police had appealed for British holidaymakers’ help in tracking down Roscaleer.
They went public with an appeal for help days after the escape as it emerged Portuguese authorities said they believed the British criminal and the other four fugitives could have crossed the border and be hiding out on or near the Costas.
Argentinian Lohrmann is regarded as the most violent of the five.
As well as the crimes he was already serving time for in Portugal, he is also suspected of the kidnap and murders of at least two children of prominent South American politicians.
