One of Britain’s most wanted criminals has been captured hiding naked in a panic room at his luxury Spanish villa.
Drugs trafficker Mark Lilley realised his home was being raided by armed police when his hunting dogs started barking in the garden.
The 41-year-old locked himself inside a panic room concealed behind a wardrobe and watched the raid on a computer screen linked to security cameras around the house.
Although officers tried unsuccessfully to force the door open several times, Lilley eventually let them in and surrendered after realising he was trapped.
Video footage released yesterday shows officers climbing over a gate before smashing their way inside with a battering ram.
The heavily tattooed, 20-stone fugitive, wearing only a towel, is seen being handcuffed before being allowed to put some trousers on so he can be taken from his villa in the town of Alhaurin de la Torre, near Malaga.
A Spanish police spokesman said: ‘After we tried to open the security door to the panic room, he gave himself up after he realised he had no other escape route.’
A police helicopter hovered above the villa during the raid, which was a joint operation by the Spanish National Police and Britain’s Serious Organised Crime Agency.
Two other men and a woman were in the house during the raid on Saturday. Officers also found a pistol.
The former gas fitter from St Helens, Merseyside, had been on the run for 13 years since skipping bail in 2000 during his trial for masterminding a £1million drugs racket.
Police had wanted him kept in custody until the outcome of his trial. But a High Court judge granted him conditional bail.
Lilley vanished at the same time as a woman clerk from his solicitor’s office after giving evidence at Bolton Crown Court. The drugs baron, who dealt in heroin, cannabis, cocaine and ecstasy, was found guilty of seven charges, including one of having a gun with intent to cause fear of violence.
He was jailed for 23 years in his absence. By then he had already started living the life of a fugitive in Europe using different aliases.
In 2003, he was spotted by an off-duty Merseyside officer in the resort of Playa de las Americas, Tenerife.
Lilley – who goes by the nicknames Coney, TJ, Fatboy, Big Vern and Mandy – was seen behind the wheel of a £40,000 Mercedes but escaped. Searches were carried out in Tenerife and other Canary islands before officers tracked him to mainland Spain, where the trail went cold.
Dave Allen, head of the fugitives unit at SOCA, said: ‘Lilley was a dangerous man with access to firearms. He had evaded capture for a long time by moving around Spain and using false identities.
‘Now he’s behind bars where he belongs and extradition proceedings are under way.
‘My message for other fugitives on the run is a simple one – we will hunt you down and you will face justice for your crimes.’
Last night, Lilley was being held at a prison near Madrid after opposing extradition at a hearing with a judge. Britain now has 40 days to submit a formal extradition request to the Spanish authorities.
A separate hearing will then take place so a judge can decide whether to authorise Lilley’s extradition.
A Spanish legal source said: ‘Lilley’s extradition – if it happens – will probably take months rather than weeks.’
Read more: Daily Mail
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