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• At least 2 dead, unknown number/severity of wounded.
• White van drove into La Rambla district (tourist hotspot with a lot of local businesses and markets as well)
• Van was getting on the sidewalks, swerving to run people over (tourists, workers, locals)
• One suspect is now inside a Turkish restaurant, police surrounding, shots have been heard (unknown from whom), unknown whether there's hostages
• A second escape van was found

• Suspect is inside the Bar Luna de Istanbul
• Police are sweeping the streets with long guns, looking for (not officially confirmed whether they exist) accomplices

• Unnamed sources saying multiple dozens of wounded, some critical
• Police trying to negotiate with suspect via loudspeaker

• Police say they think it's two suspects, not one, in the bar. Still unknown whether there's hostages.

• Restaurant name corrected, it's the bar Rey de Istanbul.
• Unofficial sources raise death toll to 6, last official count still 2.

• Police say no shots have been fired, contrary to earlier witness reports
• Catalan SWAT (GEI) equivalent is at the restaurant
• There's plenty of graphic videos of the attack on the internet (according to journalists), not looking at/for them so you're on your own there
• Unnamed police source says that a Spanish passport with an "arab name" was found in the escape van

• Official death toll now 12, number of wounded still unknown.

• Official death toll now 13.
• A better English source: BBC

• The passport found is from Melilla(North-African Spanish territory).
• Police officially calling this a terror attack, anti-terror units/protocols/whathaveyou have been activated.

• The second van was in Vic, 40 miles from Barcelona, parked next to a Burger King.

• A different official source says 1 dead and 32 wounded, there's conflicting official death tolls.
• Unofficial sources say one of the suspects is from Ripollet (town 12 miles from Barcelona).
• One newspaper is reporting that CIA warned Catalan police about Les Rambles being a possible target 2 months ago. This has not been contrasted/confirmed.

• Never mind, Rey de Istanbul was a bar where civilians took refuge. It is Luna de Istanbul where the siege/hostage situation is ongoing (hostages still not confirmed, but the police asked the suspect(s) to let people go).

• Should've known better than to look at videos of the aftermath. Seeing one of your favorite places in your hometown with the dead and dying strewn about is not healthy. They're out there if you want them, just type "Barcelona" into twitter and scroll down (past all the human filth already politicizing the attacks).

• Vic police have evacced the area around the second van, closed all traffic.
• My brother (lives less than 10 miles from the second van) says it's because they suspect explosives, but that's from hearsay so eh.
• Health services say they've attended 64 non-wounded people thus far (probably for either very light wounds from stampeding or psych damage).
• Police have also said 1 dead and 32 wounded, 10 of those in critical condition (the figure of 12-13 dead has not been retracted).
• Barcelona is "caged". The exit roads are almost completely closed (so you have to filter through a police check), train and metro is interrupted.
• Not confirmed by police, but there have been multiple arrests around the area of the attack.

• The situation at the bar either has ended, or was unrelated/confusion. Police have confirmed that they've arrested someone, and that there is no siege.

• Police sources say there's 3 suspects. One has been arrested, two are on the run.

• Someone skipped a police control and ran over a policeman. Presumed unrelated to the attack, but ugh.

• Official named sources have now confirmed the worse death toll. 13 dead and over 50 wounded is the new tally.

• One of the suspects apparently just died after an exchange of gunfire with police. This has not been confirmed by police, but reliable sources.

• The white Ford Focus that skipped a police control ran over a policeman's foot. The car was later stopped, and the driver was killed after exchanging gunfire with the police. They are now presumed to be one of the three.

• Confirmed that the police cordon around the second van in Vic is due to concerns about explosives. A 500 meter (1,640ft) has been cordoned, and all factories and buildings in the area evacuated.

• Catalan President updates the death toll to 12 dead and 80 wounded hospitalized, 15 of them critical.
• Catalan President and city's Mayor reaffirm that we are peaceful and welcoming people, and that a minority will not ruin that.
• Minute of silence scheduled for tomorrow at noon GMT +1.

• Daesh has claimed responsibility for the attack.

• A total of two suspects have been arrested, plus the dead suspect.
• No proof that the driver of the attack van was armed.
• Last night there was an explosion in a residential house in Alcanar (200km/120mi from Barcelona), and a lot of cooking gas canisters were found there (here's a link in Spanish from ABC). The place was basically vaporized, one person died and several were wounded. The police are linking that incident to the attack, though they're not specifying how/why yet (was it a botched attempt to prepare a bomb for the second van?).
• Of the detained suspects, one is the one identified earlier in the thread, the other was arrested in Alcanar and is Moroccan.
• The dead suspect, of Spanish nationality, is once again presumed not related to what happened. He broke a policewoman's femur at some point during the incident.
• The driver of the van is, if I'm understanding right, still at large.

• Many drivers are still stuck in the highways coming out Barcelona due to both panic and the police "cage", without food/water/toilets.

• Daesh has claimed responsibility through multiple channels, presumed credible unless suspects provide alternative motive/explanation.

• Report that the suspect from Melilla turned themselves in at the Ripoll police station, claiming that their documentation was stolen.

• Death toll updated to 13 dead and over 100 wounded hospitalized, 42 of them with minor injuries, 15 of them critical.

• La Rambla and its environs has just been reopened, allowing stranded tourists to return to their hotels in the area.

• 1 dead and and 6 wounded in Cambrils (town 110km/70mi from Barcelona) when a car skipped a police control. It eventually flipped, and 5 people exited the wreck with confirmed fake bomb belts and at least one knife. All five attackers were shot dead by police on the scene, and the belts detonated. Obviously also jihadists most likely, unknown if same cell or copycats.
• Manhunt is ongoing for Moussa Oubakir, 18, suspected of being the van driver.
• Death toll, with both attacks counted, is up to 14 dead and over 130 wounded, 16 critical, with people of over 34 nationalities affected.
• Over 100,000 concentrated in Barcelona for the moment of silence (and subsequent loud protest) at noon. The motto is #NoTincPor (roughly I Have No Fear).
• More arrests have been made, we're up to 4 now (3 in Ripoll, plus the 1 in Alcanar).

• Of the 5 attackers in Cambrils, 4 died immediately, 1 died later while being aided. Unknown if any information was obtained.
• 3 of the 5 Cambrils attackers' identities are now known.
• The majority of wounded/dead are not Catalan or Spanish, but tourists.
• 30 of the wounded are in risk of death.

• Autopsies and cadaver identifications are underway, forensics teams are working around the clock to make sure families can collect their dead on the spot.
• Over 100 people have been tended to by Health Services' psych teams, mostly witnesses to the attack (particularly minors) and family of those attacked. This number is expected to grow as families arrive to the city.
• The Cambrils' attackers yelled "Allah is great" (don't know in which language) when they jumped out of the car.

Denbrought said:

• Over 100,000 concentrated in Barcelona for the moment of silence (and subsequent loud protest) at noon. The motto is #NoTincPor (roughly I Have No Fear).

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• The nationalities of the dead and wounded (if/when a list of nationalities of just the dead is published, I will update):
  • Algiers
  • Argentina
  • Australia
  • Austria
  • Belgium
  • Canada
  • China
  • Colombia
  • Cuba
  • Dominican Republic
  • Ecuador
  • Egypt
  • England
  • France
  • Germany
  • Greece
  • Honduras
  • Hungary
  • Ireland
  • Italy
  • Kuwait
  • Mauritania
  • Morocco
  • Netherlands
  • Pakistan
  • Peru
  • Philippines
  • Republic of Macedonia
  • Romania
  • Spain
  • Taiwan
  • Turkey
  • United States
  • Venezuela
• One Mosso (Catalan state+local police) shot dead 4 of the 5 attackers in Cambrils by themselves.

• International reactions, such as condolences and statements of support have pourd in, as is expected... Except for Trump. Like, literally we had a 5-10 minute segment of newscast where it was country after country (and organizations like the E.U.) being kind... And then we cut to Trump spewing hate. Fucking embarrassing.

• Over 100 butane gas containers (standard type used for cooking, google "26.5L butane tank" to get an idea) have been found at the house in Alcanar, plus unspecified controlled explosives. The surrounding houses have been evacuated while the ruins are cleared and combed, and any explosive materials found documented and detonated.
• A second dead body has been found at the house in Alcanar.
• Current hypothesis is that Adbelbaki Es Satty (from Tétouan, Morocco), an imam that was working at a mosque in Ripoll, radicalized the people responsible for the attacks and was the cell's mastermind.
  • His current whereabouts are unknown, but is suspected to be one of the bodies in Alcanar.
  • Reports say that he was caught smuggling hashish into Spain in 2010, and/or arrested on some sort of immigration charge in 2012.
  • He left his job at the mosque in June, saying he was moving back to Morocco, but actually stayed in town until last Tuesday (when he told his roommate he was departing for Morocco, where his wife and kids live).
    • Some reports say he was fired by his mosque's council for missing too many days of work (including an unscheduled trip to Belgium).
    • On that note, the mosque's council says they would have never hired him had they known he had a criminal record, and that they hired him mostly because he was the one candidate available.
  • Parents of suspects say that their kids started dressing and behaving differently after he began working at the mosque.
• Manhunt is ongoing for suspect #12 (4 arrested , 5 dead, 3 missing [2 of them presumed to be the dead bodies in Alcanar]), Houssaine Abouyaaquob. He is being searched for both home and abroad, and police controls continue (specially in the frontier with France). He is suspected of having rented the vans, and he might have been driving the van at La Rambla.
  • Though not confirmed, it is suspected that he was the driver of a car that jumped a police control, and was later found parked in San Just Desvern containing a man stabbed to death.
• Some members of the terrorist cell had been at Alcanar for 6 months, so this was long in the planning. The accident in Alcanar would have up-ended their plans and forced them to improvise.
• Catalan police denies receiving any information regarding this cell, or any risk of attacks. This feeds into the popular perception that our state's forces were cut off from the central government's intelligence "pipeline".
• All 14 (or 15, if it's confirmed that the stabbing was their responsibility) victims should be identified by tomorrow, I'll post the information then.

• Identification is complete, nationalities of the 14 victims are as follow:
  • Argentinian/Spanish - 1
  • Australian/British - 1
  • Belgian - 1
  • Canadian - 1
  • Catalan - 4
  • Italian - 3
  • Portuguese - 2
  • American - 1

• Police were informed of a suspicious person at a gas station in Subirats (50km/30mi from Barcelona). They had what looked like an explosive belt on them, and the responding Mossos shot him down at 17:05h (11:05 EST). Unknown whether the suspect is alive, or if it's Younes Abouyaaqoub.

• Per Mossos' Chief, armed police approached the suspect and asked him to identify himself. In response, Younes opened his coat/shirt, revealing what looked like a bomb belt, and yelled the Takbir. Predictably, he was shot to death by the Mossos. He was identified via fingerprint match, after a bomb squad checked the belt over.
• Both the Mossos' Chief and Catalan President confirm that Younes was identified as the driver of the Barcelona van.

• Per Mossos' Chief, one of the cadavers at the exploded house is the Imam, judging by documentation found with the body and physical traits. Nevertheless, the identification is being confirmed via DNA profiling (results not in yet).
• Younes' explosive belt was fake, like those of the Cambrils attackers, and he had several knives/daggers on him.

The imam accused of masterminding the Barcelona terrorist attacks should have been deported at the end of his prison sentence for drug smuggling, but overturned the ruling by arguing it would breach his human rights, it has emerged.

Islamic preacher Abdelbaki Es Satty was told he must comply with an expulsion order when he left jail in April 2014, according to the Spanish daily, El Mundo.

But the 42-year-old Moroccan won an appeal against the decision after arguing his case in front of a judge.

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• Most suspects that are alive are now in pre-trial prison while the courts investigate. One of the suspects is on bail, given that the sum of his (proven) involvement was buying plane tickets for the terrorist cell (which is a side business of his--he buys things online using his credit card, then gets reimbursed in cash+fees by people visiting his call shop).
• A belgian policeman e-mailed a Mosso's personal e-mail account asking about Es Satty and whether they had information about him. Since it was an informal inquest, the Mosso only checked what info he had readily available, and found nothing. This might turn into a big deal.
• There's still 30-ish wounded from the attacks in hospitalized, 6 with a serious prognosis.
• Demonstration scheduled in Barcelona for tomorrow, Saturday. Most state governments are expected to have someone in attendance, along with representatives of most entities involved in the rescue/manhunt operations, and a lot of citizenry (my family included).
• A new law is being drafted to (finally) implement the EU's 2008/2013 regulations on explosive precursors (the terrorists were trying to synthesize industrial quantities of TATP, and were able to buy large quantities of the necessary precursors and catalyst with no oversight). It's in the Senate at the moment, and is due in Congress on or before October 9th.

Eriol said:

Headline: Imam behind Barcelona terror attacks used human rights to fight deportation from Spain

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shitty translation said:

The Court of the Contentious-Administrative number 2 of Castellón annulled in March of 2015 a deportation order against Abdelbaki es Satty, an imam of Ripoll and presumed mastermind behind the attacks in Barcelona and Cambrils, who died in the explosion of the house at Alcanar.

The court made this decision because of Es Satty's "developing roots" and "his effort to integrate", after serving a sentence of four years in prison for drug trafficking, dictated by a Ceuta court a few years before. State lawyers, representing the subdelegation of the Spanish government, did not appeal the judicial decision.

The judge of Castellón considered that Satty, a long-term resident, had demonstrated "obvious labor connections and efforts to integrate" through the accreditation of a valid work contract and accompanying listed term for Social Security, 6 years, 6 months and 16 days. The ruling also argues the age of the crime's commission, which took place in January 2010, and the fact that it was a single criminal act in an otherwise spotless record.

The judge refused to close the deportation proceedings due to expired or irregularities in notification requirements, as Se Satty sought, but determined that the automatic deportation for having served more than one year in prison, as requested by State prosecutors, violated the principle of proportionality brought in by recent legal doctrine.

In particular, the judge applied the new State and European jurisprudential doctrine, according to which the expulsion of a long-term resident alien sentenced by a crime punished with a penalty exceeding one year in prison is not automatic anymore. It is necessary to assess the specific circumstances of each case and determine that there is a "real and sufficiently serious threat to public order or public safety."

The judge is based on "strong European case law", as reported by the High Court of Justice of the Valencian Community (TSJCV), with references to resolutions of the Spanish Supreme Court, the Spanish Constitutional Court, and the High Courts of Justice of Castile And Leon, the Basque Country, Cantabria, and the Provincial Court of Biscay, among others.
In the resolution, the magistrate explains that "although the imputed conduct is serious, one can not ignore that we are facing a single distant criminal act in time - it's been over five years since its commission - while the presented documentation proves that he has obvious roots in Spain, which demonstrate his efforts to integrate into Spanish society, which is why I understand that [deportation due to] a single criminal act along with the rest of the exposed circumstances violates the principle of proportionality".

Abdelbaki es Satty was sentenced by in February 2012 by the Criminal Court number two from Ceuta to four years in prison for a drug trafficking offence he committed on January 1, 2010, according to the TSJCV. The same source indicates that he had no other conviction. In the judicial file, he adds, there is no information regarding his links to Islamist terrorism.

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Eriol said:

Does this judge bear any responsibility for the tragedy? Or the legislators who have the law in place that criminals can remain because of their "human rights" to not have to go back to where they're from?

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Denbrought said:

You could just as easily argue that the responsibility lies with the popular prosecution, which decided not to appeal the sentence. The system is not perfect, and relies on all its moving parts (laws, judges, juries, prosecutors, attorneys, witnesses, the executive, ...) to bring justice. Regardless, I don't think deporting him would have been the right call, given what the court knew of him.

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Eriol said:

I appreciate your more specific translation, but I think we differ here on philosophy, not necessarily on law per-se. IMO if you're not a citizen of the country, and you commit a crime, you're gone. You are there because the country agreed to let you in (for whatever entry reasons set by said country) and thus you should "keep your nose clean" (or whatever idiom is correct for the particular language) while you're essentially a guest of that country. That means no law-breaking. If you do so, you've proven you do not respect the laws of the country you are are a guest in, and thus, you should be deported.

It's about respecting those already there, who are citizens (and other legal residents/guests) who made the laws. And I put no distinction on those to whom they were born there, versus who got their citizenship after arriving in that regards. If you're a citizen that committed a crime, do the time, and then the same as any other citizen. If you're a legal guest, you're gone. If you're an ILLEGAL resident, you're also gone, for similar reasons (you obviously didn't respect their laws from the beginning).


On a side note to that: the USA thing where you have to have been born there to be President (there's a couple of exceptions, but essentially) I think is insane. A citizen is a citizen, is a citizen under the law IMO and that should include high office. Personally, I'd love for the "prediction" about Arnold Schwarzenegger to become true from Demolition Man.


But to muddy the waters more, I'm also in favor of stripping citizenship from somebody if they A) have citizenship somewhere else already (no person without a country), and B) are convicted of treasonous acts. I think in that case stripping and sending to wherever they are a citizen is OK. They've "renounced" their country through their treasonous acts. For those following Canadian Politics, IMO we'd be required to take Khadr Jr. back (but not give him $10M) since he only had 1 country, but could have stripped it from his Father (not born in Canada) before he died due to being a terrorist.


So that's where I stand on that general idea. And BTW, what I stated up there is generally what's already on-the-books in most countries that I've heard of. Enforcement of such is another discussion, though I'm in favor of enforcing ALL laws equally, and then ditching the bad laws. Selective enforcement is bad for a whole HOST of other reasons.

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Denbrought said:

I disagree with that standard. Immigrants are a useful resource, and treating them like dirt (e.g. deporting someone over a moving violation, as your overbroad statement would) is not my idea of justice. Deportation is a very heavy penalty to pay for a crime, specially if already followed by a prison sentence (which, in my understanding, is strongly thought and devised of as rehabilitative in Spanish law--not primarily punitive, though it is a component).

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Denbrought said:

My other issue with deportation is that it doesn't take into account the deportee's environment. Like with suicide, there is likely to be an impact on the surrounding people, social and economic. With prison, that impact is temporary, and thought of as necessary to return a better person to that environment. With deportation, not so much.

I can pull plenty of sob stories about people whose life has been in country X for the past Y years (where Y can be an impressively large number) being uprooted over victimless crime Z, anecdotes to illustrate what I mean. Particularly in the U.S., specially in the past 9 years.

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Denbrought said:

I do think deportation is a sometimes useful tool, particularly as a filter for habitual offenders and as a check on migratory pressure (e.g. non-refugee economic migrants not using proper channels), though.

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Denbrought said:

I think that wanting citizenship to be revocable by the state is indefensible for the same reason the death penalty or summary executions are. I do not trust any state that currently exists with that power, and I'm surprised you do.

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Denbrought said:

Blind enforcement of the law is as bad as capricious enforcement. Keep in mind that things like the test that was used to keep Es Satty in the country were newer laws superceding or refining existing ones--exactly how it's supposed to work in any sane precedent-law system.

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Denbrought said:

Judicial latitude (along with sane methods for electing judges and replacing them) holds a lot of appeal for me. It introduces more variance in justice, but strange outcomes can often be appealed (with things like double jeopardy making sure the scale is tipped against the state). The other end is, in my view, prosecutorial discretion (i.e. choosing what charges to pursue, which is always the state's prerogative), which is ripe for abuse when mandatory sentencing is involved.

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Bubble181 said:

You don't seem to understand the concept of asylum. No, you don't have the right to move or live wherever you want. You do have the right to live. A gay Nigerian who will literally get shot in his own country and has escaped, an Afghani who helped Western troops and has his life threatened, muslim girls fleeing Somalia because they were to be genitally cut and forcibly married off...
Any of these happen to get caught up in something illegal and you'd send them back? Good luck, it's against a whole bunch of international treaties.

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Eriol said:

They ARE useful to countries... that get to choose who comes, and who stays. You do NOT have a right to travel anywhere you wish, and stay as you wish. I agree a moving violation seems absurd (and isn't a felony. If I should have specified such, OK), but if that's what the people there want, then they have that right too.


They are guests of the country, not citizens. They have NO right to stay unless they become a citizen.

We agree on the action, but possibly not the reason.

I agree this is a "you're playing with fire" kind of thing, but the bar (when we had such a law in Canada) was extremely high. Saying "no, forever" I think is even more problematic.

I'm a fan of due process, but it's the uneven enforcement of laws that leads to a lot of the abuse of systems IMO.

To ME at least, this is my problem with the whole "Hillary Emails" thing. it's not that it was a HUGE deal (big maybe, but not huge having a "very hackable" server with secret-level emails on it) but that if it were just about anybody else they'd at LEAST have to go to court over it, and probably end up in jail. But because she was powerful, she got away with it and wasn't even charged, or even her tech guy who set it up! Nobody involved was. Uneven application of laws ends up with the powerful RARELY being brought to account, and the weak ending up with overburdened Public Defenders and all the problems there.

What I'm advocating for is once EVERYBODY is charged, then NOBODY is because the laws themselves get thrown out. There should be relatively LITTLE prosecutorial discretion, but a good amount more for judges, due to innocent until proven guilty. Less laws are better than many laws with discretion, as that just means more possibilities for abuse.

But in the case of non-citizens, being found guilty means you're gone. You get the appeals process like anybody else, but you fucked up royally. You had your chance, we don't want PROVEN (in court) lawbreakers in the country if there's a way that they don't have to be.

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• A 51-year-old German woman, critically wounded in the Barcelona attack, died in the hospital, raising the death toll of the attacks to 16.
• There was a massive march in Barcelona yesterday in remembrance of the victims (English source: The Guardian). Attendance estimates vary between 200-500k from what I've seen (reliable-ish sources with aerial counting capabilities like police).