Year: 2015

The National Civil Protection Authority (ANPC) and the Safe Communities Portugal (SCP), a civil society organization that promotes awareness-raising initiatives in the fields of security and help with the English-speaking community residing or visiting the Algarve, have decided to join forces in order to provide information on the risk of forest fires and measures to be adopted if confronted with a fire to the English-speaking citizens who are visiting Portugal and our rural areas.

The materialized initiative in preparing a leaflet ‘Fire Safety in Rural Areas Tourists’.

Aware of the role and value that the information citizens have in building safer and more resilient communities, both institutions joined forces preparing a brochure in English with general information, useful advice and self-protection measures that are intended to provide tourists who visit us a more pleasant and profitable enjoyment of outdoor activities in contact with nature, such as camping, the caravan, walking, mountaineering, cycling, etc.

Francisco Grave Pereira, President of the ANPC, said that the position of Safe Communities Portugal is “illustrative of the enormous civic sense of the organization in civil society that reflects the careful attention it attaches to the safety and welfare of not only British visitors but, as the brochure features a wider target audience, this includes citizens of other nationalities and English speakers.”

David Thomas, President SCP, said that “since we are receiving more and more visitors in this country who engage in multiple and varied outdoor activities in contact with nature, it is important that they are aware of the preventive measures and precautions to take in order to be able to contribute to protect and defend the forests against fire “.

Besides the brochure that will be distributed in numerous public places further information is available either on site of the ANPC (www.prociv.pt) or at the site of SCP (www.safecommunitiesportugal.com).

The notice can be downloaded here

Police are advising Facebook users to watch out for a scam that tricks people into hacking into their own accounts.

The hoax works by telling people that following a series of instructions will guarantee them access to anybody’s account.

It tells victims to open up Facebook in a web browser and go to the Facebook page of the person they want to hack. Then, it says, the user should right-click anywhere on the page and from the popup menu select “Inspect Element”. This brings up an HTML editor at the bottom half of the web browser.

In this editor, the scam instructs readers to copy-paste a string of code given.

But far from giving the user access to another account, following the guidance merely provides the scammers with all the details they need to access the would-be hacker’s account.

Once the fraudsters are in control of a user’s account, they can use it to post more fake instructions, or launch new scams.

Facebook has warned users not to paste any strange code into browsers.

“If you see this kind of scam on Facebook, you should report it by clicking the arrow in the upper-right corner of the post and selecting ‘This is Spam.’

“If you have fallen victim to this scam, you should contact Facebook immediately and consider changing your password.”

The Judicial Police, through the National Unity Combating Drug Trafficking, conducted an operation that has succeeded in dismantling the European component and part of the South American component of a highly organized transcontinental criminal association, which was engaged in covert cocaine trafficking originating in Brazil and destined for Europe.

The criminal organization in question, composed of Brazilian and Portuguese nationals., carrying out their crimes in both countries. The investigation was conducted over a period of about a year. and culminated with the arrest of five men, as well as the seizure of 491 kg of cocaine, four motor vehicles, several thousand euros and foreign currencies, a large amount of telecommunications equipment and information technology, several firearms including a pistol, two rifles and a shotgun, hundreds of ammunition, among other goods and objects resulting from their criminal activity.

The five detainees, aged between 32 and 52 years, were presented at the first judicial interrogation and four have been placed under remand in custody and a fifth confined to his residence and prohibition of contact with the other suspects. The investigation is continuing in the context of international cooperation.

On 31st July the Judicial Police, through the National Unit to Combat Drug Trafficking (UNCTE), conducted an operation that succeeded in breaking up an organized group dedicated to cocaine trafficking. The criminal organization concerned, consisting of Portuguese individuals, were involved in importing the drugs to Portugal from South America by air.

Following an 8 month investigation, the operation led to the arrest of two men, as well as the seizure of 9.5 kilograms of cocaine, two top range motor vehicles and other goods and objects resulting from their criminal activity. The detainees, aged 54 and 58 years old, were present at the first judicial interrogation.

On 31^st July the Setúbal GNR Traffic Detachment conducted a surveillance operation on the A2 motorway checking both north and southbound vehicles, aimed at road racing in the area.

During the operation some of the drivers involved tried to evade the GNR interception points, performed dangerous manoeuvres including reversing against the direction of travel. During the speed control operation one vehicle, a modified 1993 Honda Civic, was recorded at travelling at 243km / h. The vehicle a driver were intercepted 12 kms from the radar point. Drivers caught were fined between €500 and 1000,

Eight men three of them British, the remainder being Dutch, Canadian and Swiss were sentenced to imprisonment from between 6 – 10 years recently for their involvement in a drug trafficking case in the Algarve in July 2014.

The men were arrested in Lagos by the Judicial Police after attempting to import 167 kgs of Cocaine which was landed at Sines. The drugs had a value of around 8 million euros and was destined for distribution in Europe. The Dutch national received 10 years; a British national 8 years for receiving and the crew from between 6-9 years.

It was announced on 1st August by a SEF union representative that the SEF Inspectors have decided to suspend strike action because they have reached an agreement with government. They had demanded equal treatment with the PSP and GNR.

In mid-July, inspectors announced several strikes if the Government did not find a solution to end “discrimination” compared to the GNR and PSP in respect of the General Labour Law on Civil Servants. According to the president of the Research Career Union and Monitoring of Foreigners and Borders Service ( SCIF / SEF), Acacio Pereira, the law has allowed the inspectors to be treated “in a discriminatory manner on issues such as evaluation of the performance, availability and even administrative practices.” The law equates inspectors to other civil servants and are not assigned the exception status granted to the other two security forces. Thus, an officer of the PSP or GNR working under the European Agency for borders (Frontex) “receives compensation at 100% while a SEF inspector receives 60 % of that.

After several meetings, the union reached an agreement with the government on Wednesday and therefore decided to suspend the strike, “state secretaries of Interior and Public Administration undertook to recommend to Council of Ministers measures to end discrimination “.

The action planned for August would have resulted in severe disruption at airports at the peak of the tourist season.

 

It was reported on 28th July that four persons had been arrested for rape and sexual abuse of two tourists. The four young men were in custody.

The Judicial Police (PJ) of Lisbon announced on Tuesday the arrest of four men, aged between 16 and 23 years for rape and sexual abuse of two English tourists, one of them incapable of resistance. According to PJ, the four detainees, Portuguese and foreign residents from Switzerland, were on holiday in Portugal and met two English women, 20 to 23, who were also on holiday, and the six went out together for two days in bars and clubs in Lisbon.

Last Tuesday, the suspects lured the victims to an apartment where they were staying in Sintra where the offences were committed taking advantage of the drunken state of the victims. The detainees were present at the first judicial interrogation.

From 20^th to 24^th July the Police Public Security (PSP), continuing their objectives to prevent road fatalities undertook Operation “Pela Vida, Trave” in various parts of the country. The operation’s objective was to monitor drivers and take action against those, who through their behaviour jeopardize road safety and put others at risk.

The operation involved 442 enforcement actions, which involved 2,860 police officers and 998 vehicles. The objectives were achieved with the following results:

Totally 21,024 vehicles were inspected 4,860 Notices of administrative offense were issued and there were 272 seizures.

Breath tests were conducted on 4,949 drivers with 70 offenses being identified.

There were 100 arrests.

• Driving under the influence of alcohol (more than 1.2 G / G): 45 held;
• Lack of legal authorization to drive: 32 detainees;
• Other crimes: 23 arrested

Through radar 106,322 vehicles were checked and there were 2,371 verified violations for speeding.

• Violations Light: 314
• Serious Violations: 1,840
• Very Serious Infractions: 217

There were also a total of 3,037 violations broken down as follows:

• Lack of insurance: 47
• Lack of inspection: 161
• Mobile phone use while driving: 331
• Non-use of the seat belt: 165
• Disobeying traffic signals: 109
• Parking in the passages marked for pedestrian crossing: 155
• Parking on sidewalks and other places for the movement of pedestrians: 329

 

Publico newspaper has reported on 24th July that in 2014, there were 180 people serving sentences of imprisonment at home with electronic monitoring, according to the annual report of the probation service, currently included in the Welfare Directorate General and Correctional Services. This type of substitution penalty was introduced in criminal law in 2007 and has been increasingly applied. Last year alone the probation services, responsible for the management of electronic surveillance, received 109 new requests under the so-called “on-call system in the room.”

This option is available for cases in which the judge imposes a term of imprisonment not exceeding one year and may be extended to sentences of less than two years and “are verified at the time of conviction, circumstances of personal or family nature of the convict who advise against deprivation of liberty in prison. ” The law specifies a number of situations such as pregnancy, age less than 21 or greater than 65 or the existence of family responsibilities.

The Deputy Director Welfare of the Directorate General and Correctional Services (DGRSP), Licinio Lima, said that 67 people currently serving prison sentences at home. “The number is too low and this also has to do with the law which allows this possibility to those who are sentenced to less than or equal to one year,” he says. He regrets that there are “a lot of people in prison who have no criminal history, but are arrested for not paying fines or because they have been caught more than once driving without legal authorization.”

The official points out that they “are not inherently criminal, but run the risk of becoming so in prison.” The DGRSP, he said, has a proposal ready for a prison sentence in housing to be extended to individuals with sentences up to two years and with the possibility to attend activities and programs outside the home.

The report, to which the PUBLICO had access, does not specify the types of crimes where this penalty was applied, but the teacher of the Law School of the University of Porto Andre Leite, who is doing his doctorate on this topic, exemplifies some: Road crimes, shoplifting and bodily harm. “The alternatives to imprisonment wish to avoid contact with the prison environment, because since the nineteenth century it is known that this contact is criminógeno” he explains.

Directorate-General for Justice Statistics Policy show that between 2007 and 2013, the prison housing was applied 513 times.

The report of the reintegration services reports that last year, there was an increase of 33% in the use of electronic bracelets to monitor the ban on contacts associated with domestic violence. In 2014, there were 327 applications compared with 245 the previous year. Licinio Lima justifies the increase with the fact that the “Portuguese society is very sensitive to the crime of domestic violence.”The Deputy Director also highlighted that in addition to the 590 prisoners who are currently in jail for crimes in this regard, “about 600 are integrated into psycho-educational programs.”

The document also reveals that, in 2014, 116 young people were on the waiting list to meet an internment in an educational center. The main reason may have been the end of the Educational Center of Santa Clara, in Vila do Conde, which had a capacity of 48 places, which have reduced the total number of vacancies in these centers that seek to reintegrate minors who have committed criminal offenses.