Around 9.30pm on August 31, a thief managed to manipulate the lock to a room at the Sahara Bay Hotel in Arenal.
Spanish, aged 39, he stole an iPhone 7 Plus, a Samsung A10 phone, an Apple Watch and four credit cards. The stolen items all belonged a Ukrainian female refugee; the hotel had welcomed a group of refugees last summer.
The woman had been in the next room when the theft occurred. She heard something and found that the door to her room was open and that she had been robbed. She and other guests spotted the thief and gave a description to the hotel receptionist. He and two security guards went to look for him and came across him outside the nearby Playa Sol Hostel. One of the guards was able to restrain him until a National Police patrol arrived.
Ukrainian guests told the police that they had previously seen him in the hotel. He admitted to the police that he had committed previous robberies and that stolen items were at his mother's home. One of these items included a television that had been taken from a room at the same hotel.
He will shortly go on trial. The Prosecutor's Office is seeking a three-year sentence.