Stay Safe in Ibiza: How Tourists Are Losing £430,000 Watches in Seconds
THIS is the shocking moment one Ibiza tourist has a €500,000 (£430,000) watch stolen from right off his wrist. Zara McDermott’s new BBC show Ibiza: Secrets of the Party Island has revealed how watch-targeting gangs take only seconds to snatch a timepiece.
Zara, 27, is no stranger to a holiday on the island, having visited there many times, including as a social media influencer. Having showcased the glitz and glamour of life in Ibiza, she’s now revealing the dark side to the island, including its criminal underbelly. The idyllic island popular with Brit tourists looking for a good time has developed a problem with watch crime. Spanish police show Zara how one €500,000 Richard Mille watch was stolen off the arm of a man inside a Rolls Royce.
An undercover officer plays CCTV of a man in a motorbike helmet walk past the Phantom casing the watch. He then doubles back to the motor with its window down, reaches inside, and after a quick struggle, yanks the watch off the man’s arm and jumps on the back of a motorbike. Zara says the crime took place so quickly, with the officer saying it only takes three seconds.
Police later arrested the gang and found cash, cellphones, and the motorbike helmets. “We have more [stealing] and more because of wealthy people,” says one police officer. On the strip one night in early June, police find one tourist who has had a €10,000 (£8,600) Rolex snatched right off his hand. The man describes one man coming up to him and grabbing his arm then forcing the watch off it before he can react.
Zara meets Marcus, a Brit who runs a private security firm on Ibiza, who explains how the crime outfits works. Marcus says street level crime is sophisticated and the gangs are Neapolitan mafia who specifically come to the island to steal.
Marcus says that when an expensive watch is spotted then a gang member will follow them out of the club, while another will then follow them back to their home. The thieves will then break into the house and steal the watch and then get it on the black market in wealthy cities like Dubai.