National Police agents have arrested 22 members of the environmental organization Vegetable Future for forming a criminal structure and causing damage to assets worth more than half a million euros.
The arrests were carried out in a coordinated manner in the cities of Madrid, Barcelona, Cádiz, Murcia, Elda (Alicante), Zaragoza, Granada, Valencia, Soria, Santander and San Sebastián. Among those detained are its three top leaders, who coordinated and directed the group as a criminal organization. The investigation began in January 2022, after several people threw paint at the facade of the Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food in Madrid.
Since then, members of this group have acted in other parts of Spain, carrying out, among other criminal acts, new throwing of paint at buildings and artistic works in museums, blocking traffic on roads or accessing runways at different airports.
The progress of the police investigations confirmed that this organization was made up of a large number of members, with a clear distribution of tasks, coordinated by leaders – known as “dynamicists” – who had management roles and received remuneration for their responsibilities.
Their repeated and sustained activity over time managed, in turn, to establish relationships, at an international level, with other similar groups that were already associated in their countries of origin with criminal organizations.