Spanish Robin Hood borrows from the rich
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A man claiming to be a Spanish Robin Hood says he has tricked banks into lending him nearly half a million euros.
Enric Duran, 32, says he has given much of the money to social activists opposed to the financial system, reports the Daily Telegraph.
He also used it to circulate 200,000 copies of a single-issue free newspaper called Crisis showing how he had spent the past two years fooling the banks into lending him the money, which he is refusing to pay back.
He said: "If we include interest on arrears the present amount of debt is over 500,000 euros (£395,000), which I will not pay.
"What could be better than robbing the ones who rob us and distributing the money among the groups which are denouncing this situation and building alternatives?
"It has been an individual disobedience action against banking that I have carried out to denounce the banking system."
Mr Duran, from Barcelona, provided a list of 39 banks which he took loans from, including one bank that gave him five loans.
He had started out by getting personal loans but eventually used a company name to avoid being placed on a list of bad debtors.
The local police said they would not start looking for Mr Duran until one of the banks made a formal request. The activist could face a jail sentence of up to six years if convicted but said he was prepared for the possibility.
Jordi Mestre, director general of the Caixa Sabadell savings bank, said: "It is not permissible for someone to laugh at the system like this."
-Ananova
