British and Irish expats have been left devastated after a ‘mafia’ arson attack destroyed a row of bars and restaurants on the Costa del Sol.
A total of seven businesses were left gutted by the inferno, which began at around 5am on Salvador Allende street in Torremolinos last Sunday.
Video footage shared with the Spanish Eye shows how the fire began in the middle of the row of businesses before spreading outwards in both directions.
In another new clip, an 18-year-old business owner can be seen being dragged away from the inferno in hysterics – having only bought her establishment a month earlier.
Sources told this paper on Monday that one bar in the centre was the target and that the blaze was sparked as part of an ongoing feud with Irish criminals.
Brian Ennis, 66, from Salford, Manchester, is one of the business owners caught in the crossfire.
‘Everything was made from wood so it’s all gone,’ he told the Spanish Eye from outside his destroyed bar, called Champagne Charlies.
‘I got a phone call to say it was up in flames and came down to find it completely destroyed.’
Ennis has been running the bar for six years, and took it over from the previous owner after visiting it for more than 18 years.
‘I have never seen anything like this in all my years living here, it’s shocking, just terrible.’
Ennis did not comment on the mafia links but confirmed there had been a couple of separate incidents in the days before the inferno.
‘We keep ourselves to ourselves and don’t get involved with what’s going on in other bars,’ he added.
However Joseph Johnson, 57, who owns a curry restaurant a few doors down revealed there was a stabbing incident a few nights earlier.
‘There’s been problems for a while, it started on Thursday, police came and closed down one of the bars after a stabbing. Five people were stabbed, two of them in the neck.
‘Then someone started a fire at a bar on Friday but it was put out, then on Sunday the major fire happened, there was a big explosion and it spread so fast, it was not a normal fire.’
Sources told the Spanish Eye the feud is between one of the bar owners and Irish criminals.
Paul Kearns, 60, from Dublin, owns the Maguire’s Irish bar, which also became an unintended target.
He told the Spanish Eye: ‘It’s terrible, we’ve been running the bar for two years and never seen something like this, we are still assessing the damage.’
He said he would not comment further until the police finished their investigation.
Perhaps among the worst-hit victims is 18-year-old Taspia Akhter, who spent her life savings buying the kebab shop at the end of the row only a month ago.
Breaking into tears, she told the Spanish Eye: ‘I have lost everything, I put all my savings, around €73,000, into buying and renovating the place and I was in the process of getting insurance but I was too late – in fact I had an appointment today with the insurance people.
‘I found out today that I won’t get a cent. The mayor told Spanish press she would pay for the rebuild but all I’ve been told is they will provide bins for the rubble.
‘Even if I could rebuild it I don’t think I could run it again due to the trauma.
‘My dream was to become a pilot and the restaurant was going to help pay for training, which is around €120,000, even my sister who is only 16 invested in the restaurant, now I have nothing, I’m completely devastated.’
Akhter, originally from Bangladesh and who ‘grew up around the world’ and speaks perfect English, said she was painting the restaurant when the fire began a few doors down.
‘We read online that there were reports the fire started in our restaurant but that is totally untrue, we were painting our place when it happened, there were some strange sounds and then a big bang, my little brother was with me completely terrified.’
Akhter confirmed that a few nights before that she saw men running down the street with blood ‘spurting out of their necks’ following the stabbing incident.
She added: ‘I don’t want to say anything else because the police have told me not to speak to anyone, they said this is a really serious investigation potentially involving the mafia, it’s really scary.’
Police refused to comment on the mafia claims or the fire in general when contacted by the Spanish Eye.
A spokesperson from Spain’s National Police said: ‘The investigation is ongoing and we cannot provide any details.’
It follows a string of deadly mafia incidents involving English and Irish gangsters along the Costa del Sol this year.
More than 100 mafia groups are said to be operating along the 90-mile stretch of coastline, situated in Spain’s southernmost region of Andalucia.
The holiday hotspot has long been a centre of operations for organised crime, thanks to its strategic location as the first port of call for hashish and arms from Africa, and cocaine from South America.
On July 31, an alleged British hitman was arrested in the nearby town of Mijas after crashing his car and trying to flee on foot.
The unnamed gangster is said to be a member of one of Britain’s most feared mafias, and is allegedly responsible for multiple assassinations.
He had no identification when he was arrested in the Riviera del Sol complex, but cops found two guns, one with a silencer, in his wrecked Nissan Qashqai – and a book about how to practice Buddhism.
They also discovered ammunition for the pistols and a notebook with names and addresses written down.
On May 31, two Scottish gangsters were gunned down inside a packed bar in Fuengirola.
A man suspected of carrying out the assassinations was later arrested in Liverpool.
The chilling attack saw a masked gunman step out of a vehicle and open fire on a group of people at a bar on the Rey de España promenade – one of the town’s main tourist strips.
He then fled, leaving two men fatally wounded.
The victims, Ross Monaghan and Eddie Lyons Jr., allegedly linked to Glasgow’s notorious Lyons crime family, were shot multiple times in what investigators suspect was a drug-related hit.
On April 21, a 32-year-old Liverpudlian was gunned down in the middle of the street in Mijas – just a 20-minute drive from the villa of Charlie Mullins, Britain’s richest plumber.
The murder happened in a street called Don Jose de Orbaneja, where there is a well-known tennis and padel tennis club called Club del Sol as well as a neighbouring holiday resort called Finca Naundrup which has sports facilities.
Read more Andalucia news at the Spanish Eye.
