Overview

• Police assisting an eviction on 23 September in Biarritz discovered roughly five tonnes of cut telephone cables inside a squatted house.
• Officers seized the haul, valued at about €63,000, and found an improvised workshop with burners, a cooling tank, and equipment for cutting and packing.
• According to police, the cables were taken from Orange’s telephone network, and five Romanian men aged 19 to 41 were arrested.
• In immediate-appearance proceedings, the alleged leader received one year in prison, while four co-defendants got eight-month suspended sentences and a three-year ban from the Pyrénées-Atlantiques.
• The property had been occupied illegally for about seven months and, per the public land agency’s manager, was outfitted with a surveillance camera and located near routes often used to resell copper in Spain.