Nélida Alves and Sidney Pereira, aged 42 and 44, are accused of committing four crimes of aggravated robbery, three crimes of kidnapping, one crime of aggravated coercion, one crime of simple damage and two crimes of document forgery.

The suspects, dubbed by the Portuguese press as 'Bonnie and Clyde', are suspected of a wave of robberies at several service stations in the Algarve, having threatened employees and kidnapped others.

Robberies

The first case took place on the night of July 25, 2022, at a gas station in Estoi, Faro, and the second two days later, also at night, in Lagos, an assault in which the couple forced the gas station employee to follow them in their own vehicle after completing the robbery.

On the night of July 27, the GNR and the PJ tried to surround the suspects on a road near Bensafrim, in Lagos, to detain them, but the couple managed to escape.

According to the prosecution, when confronted with the police barrier, Sidney did not obey the authorities' orders to stop, reversed to gain space, and almost ran over the officers, who swerved and continued forward, hitting the back of a police car.

After this attempted arrest, the couple went to a gas station in Lagos, where they carried out another robbery, this time kidnapping the employee and taking him in their own car, driven by Sidney and with Nélida and the victim in the back seat.

Sidney then drove the victim's car along Estrada Nacional (EN) 125, towards Lagoa, on a 40-minute journey, during which Nélida held the gun in her hand and had a knife at her feet, as stated in court.

The man was then left at the entrance to the city of Silves, and the defendants, as they said, gave him around 20 euros so he could catch a taxi, and then fled in the victim's vehicle so they could go unnoticed by the authorities.

On the night of August 1, the couple carried out a new robbery at a gas station in Almancil, Loulé, travelling in a car with Spanish registration plates.

Nélida and Sidney filled up the vehicle, waited for the customers to leave and then entered the store, with Sidney threatening the two employees with a gun and speaking in Spanish, while Nélida held a knife.

The couple then ordered the staff to lock themselves inside the bathroom for fifteen minutes and fled.

Drug use

Nélida, who admitted in court to having been a drug addict for 23 years, tried to justify the crimes with the psychological state she was in due to drug use and also because their son was taken away from them both shortly before, aged nine months.

Sidney claimed that during those days the couple was out of their mind due to drug abuse, admitting that at that time the couple consumed five grams of heroin and five grams of cocaine a day, in addition to taking medications used for anxiety disorders (benzodiazepines).

After the robberies in the Algarve, the couple crossed the border into Spain in Ayamonte, where they continued violent robberies at service stations in Seville, Badajoz and Toledo, always using the same 'modus operandi' of intimidating employees with a gun and a knife.

Sidney and Nélida were arrested in Zamora, on August 13, 2022, following a complaint by a citizen, who recognised the suspects in a shopping center and alerted the Guardia Civil.

At that time, the suspects were traveling in a car that they had stolen in Madrid and were arrested while having dinner inside the vehicle, having been surrounded by agents of the National Police, who detained them without them offering resistance.

In the press, the defendants were identified as the possible perpetrators of a triple homicide in Bragança, even though there is no official confirmation from the Portuguese authorities regarding the crimes attributed to them.

The trial continues during the afternoon at the Faro Court with the hearing of witnesses.