Riot Police Evict 87-Year-Old Woman From Spanish Apartment

Dramatic video footage captures Spanish riot police battering their way into an 87-year-old woman's Madrid apartment after supporters stacked furniture against the door in a desperate attempt to halt her eviction.

Maricarmen Abascal lost her home of seven decades on Wednesday. An investment firm doubled and tripled her rent, triggering furious protests across Spain. The rental price jumped by 275 per cent under the new terms.

Inside the flat, officers smashed through a barricade made of chairs, shelves, and a lamp to enforce the court order. Maricarmen stood inside with her cousin Vicente, her niece, and members of the Tenants' Union as they watched their sanctuary crumble around them. A sharp sound echoed before the door gave way and the makeshift wall collapsed. Despite pleas from her supporters outside, she was removed from the property while violent clashes erupted in the upmarket Retiro district of central Madrid.

Activists tried to block the officers but were overpowered. Riot police forced their entry even as Maricarmen waited for health workers who whisked her away in an ambulance with just thirty minutes to pack her life into boxes.

The company driving this legal action, Urbagestión Desarrollo e Inversión SL, is run by investment brothers Ricardo Alonso Fernández and Fernando Alonso Fuentes. They purchased Maricarmen's flat in 2018 for roughly €240,000 (£207,000). Both men are lawyers who founded the firm in 2005. Their portfolio includes more than a dozen other businesses spanning property, construction, and pharmacy advisory services.

Maricarmen had paid about €440 (£379) a month under her old tenancy agreement. The owners suddenly proposed a rent of €1,650 (£1,420). Her lawyer claims the brothers never spoke to her directly during the eight years they owned the unit.

British pianist James Rhodes later admitted contacting Urbagestión to offer payment for Maricarmen's rent or to buy the apartment outright so she could stay. The firm rejected both offers without hesitation.

Supporters camped outside the building on Tuesday night, joined by celebrities including Carlos Bardem and singer Ana Belén, who read Rafael Alberti's poem Desahucio (Eviction). Police arrested and dragged away dozens of activists chanting outside to cries of 'shame!' from the crowd. The legal fight reached the Supreme Court, which ruled for the firm and cleared the path for eviction.

After leaving the building, Maricarmen was taken to Gregorio Marañón Hospital.

She turned down the free emergency placement offered by the city and is believed to be staying with a relative. Amnesty International Spain condemned the situation as a violation of human rights, calling it a system that places the speculative interests of a vulture fund above Maricarmen's right to stay in her home. It isn't an isolated case, it is just another portrayal of the suffering that thousands of households go through in Spain, according to their statement.

In an interview with public broadcaster RTVE recorded on Tuesday, Maricarmen called the company inhuman and all in order to make money. You cannot make a person live for seven years with a machete hanging over their neck, she said, blaming national, regional, and city authorities for her plight. Maricarmen Abascal was carried from the building on a stretcher and taken away in an ambulance as demonstrators chanted Maricarmen, you are not alone.

Maricarmen was forcibly evicted from her home of 70 years on Wednesday after an investment firm hiked her rent by 275 per cent, sparking furious riots across Spain. Hundreds of protesters took to the streets of Madrid as this eighty-seven-year-old woman was removed from the apartment she had called home for seven decades. Pictured: Police confront demonstrators during a protest in Madrid following the eviction.

Socialist Housing Minister Isabel Rodriguez insisted the minority Leftist government had repeatedly tried to pass a law to ban such evictions and accused the conservative-run Madrid region of rolling out the red carpet for these speculators. Housing has for years been a top concern for Spaniards as supply falls short of demand, with rents and purchasing prices soaring relentlessly as elsewhere in the European Union.

Residents in the world's second-most visited country blame short-term tourist rentals such as Airbnb for driving up prices and cutting supply, sparking protests in hotspots including Barcelona. I'm leaving Madrid, because Madrid isn't Madrid. And the people of Madrid are no longer Madrilenos. They are all the tourists that you have in Gran Via, Maricarmen told RTVE, referring to the Spanish capital's main commercial thoroughfare.

Earlier this year, it emerged that more than 100,000 half-finished homes currently lie empty in Spain, after locals spent years complaining that they had nowhere to live. Data from Spain's Ministry of Housing indicates that this vast array of unfinished homes is only a portion of those in the country. The government's report into the issue only tracked developments that were meant to host at least 1,000 homes and had building levels of less than 70 per cent.

On top of this, there is enough developed land with streetlights and roads but no homes in Spain for 390,000 homes. Many of these developments exist in an eerie state of limbo as a result of the 2008 financial crisis, with many housebuilders defaulting on loans and declaring bankruptcy, unable to pay their loans back. And since then, the country's property development market has come to something of a standstill.

The Bank of Spain estimates that there is currently a shortage of almost 700,000 homes. Because of this, demand for homes has surged, and Spanish residents have increasingly felt priced out of their communities. In the last few years, they have taken much of their anger on tourists and non-residents who buy up homes in holiday hotspots. Riots and protests have blighted many of Spain's biggest tourist cities, including Madrid, Barcelona, Malaga, and Mallorca's Palma. And in many parts of the country, legislation about banning Britons from buying property is being debated.