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Booking.com (Photo: Screenshot/booking.com)
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Booking.com (Photo: Screenshot/booking.com)
Tuesday, 13 October 2015 - 11:17
Two arrested in supermarket extortion case
On Friday the Groningen police arrested two suspects in connection with the extortion and bombings of several stores of supermarket chain Jumbo over the past few months. The suspects are in custody and will be questioned by the police in the coming days.
A press conference will be held on Tuesday afternoon during which the police and Public Prosecutor will give more information on the arrests and case. In a previously released case file, the police described the perpetrator as an educated man between the ages of 20 and 40 years with knowledge of explosives, computers and electronics. It is unclear whether the arrested suspects match these descriptions.
In May of this year two packages containing explosives were found at Jumbo stores in Groningen. One of them exploded and caused a significant amount of damage. No one was injured. On July 1st a Jumbo store in Zwolle received a birthday card containing explosives in the mail.
The perpetrator demanded a large amount in digital currency Bitcoins. Jumbo refused to pay. The police in Noord-Nederland launched a manhunt for the perpetrator, also releasing a large amount of details of the case file and asking the public's help and offered an reward for the golden tip. This led to a large number of tips and questions coming in. It is unclear whether any of these tips led to the arrests.
Extra security measures were taken at all 579 Jumbo branches following these incidents. This led to a few false alarms, such as the Jumbo store in Rosmalen being evacuated for a beeping low battery and a branch in Nijmegen being evacuated for a bowl of potato salad.