World
Dramatic moment British Tinder rape suspect arrested in Costa del Sol
- James Clacher was arrested on a Costa del Sol beach by Spanish cops
- He allegedly raped two women he met on Tinder
- Plain-clothes cops arrested him while he worked out
This is the dramatic moment a British fugitive accused of raping two women he met on Tinder in Scotland was arrested as he worked out on a Costa del Sol beach.
James Clacher, 55, was hanging upside down on a rope as he honed his muscles during a punishing strength training routine when he was jumped on by two plain-clothes officers posing as tourists.
Video footage showed one cop with a sunhat on running up to Clacher as a female police officer approached him from behind.
They and two other colleagues who arrived seconds later pinned the well-built Scot to the sand before handcuffing his hands behind his back and hauling him away from the beach.
Detectives let him cover up his tattooed bare chest with a T-shirt before taking him to a police station where he was fingerprinted and had his mugshot taken.
Spain‘s Civil Guard released the first footage of the high-profile arrest today as they revealed Clacher’s keep-fit obsession proved his downfall and led to his detention in the Costa del Sol tourist resort of Nerja, east of Malaga.
The arrest occurred on May 21 but detectives in Spain had yet to make any official comment or release images of the day they held the fugitive.
The 55-year-old was due to stand trial accused of attacking two women he met on Tinder.
He was to face allegations that he raped a woman at a Troon flat in August 2019, and that he carried out another attack on a woman at a flat in Gorbals, Glasgow in September 2020.
The gym boss was last seen in Airdrie, Lanarkshire, on May 30 2022 and was reported missing.
Revealing he had been found and held in Spain, a Police Scotland spokesman said earlier this year: ‘A 55-year-old man was arrested on an international arrest warrant in Spain on Tuesday, 21 May.
‘We are liaising with partner agencies, and he will be subject to extradition proceedings.’
The arrest was carried out by the Civil Guard’s centralised UCO fugitives unit, which in September 2022 arrested UK-born alleged gangster Johnny Morrissey and his wife Nicola.
A spokesman for the police force said today in its first comments on the operation to snare Clacher, appropriately named Operation Clacher: ‘The operation began when Britain’s National Crime Agency received an anonymous tip-off saying he could be living in Nerja and immediately made contact with the Civil Guard’s UCO unit.
‘This information, together with other data about the fugitive which indicated his life was closely linked to sport, enabled officers to trace him to that town.
‘They discovered he was well integrated into the sports community.
‘Once his identity had been confirmed following discreet surveillance, he was arrested while he practiced calisthenics in a recreational area of Nerja beach.
‘This individual, described as dangerous by Scottish Police, was accused of sexually assaulting two women he had met over a dating app.
‘His trial was suspended while the search for him began, and he had fled to avoid arrest.’
It was not immediately clear today if Clacher is opposing extradition or has agreed to be flown back to the UK so he can face trial.
He has already appeared before a judge at Spain’s Audiencia National court in Madrid which deals with extraditions.
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