It is called La Rápida, it is played clandestinely in Malaga and it is probably the oldest illegal lottery of the twenty that currently operate in Spain, since its birth dates back to the 40s. “La Rápida began to develop in the neighborhoods closest to the center of the capital, having a singular acceptance due to the ‘seriousness’ and speed [hence its name] in delivering the prizes, as something ‘sacred’”, reads the chapter dedicated to the year 1973 of Chronicle of a dream, Memory of the Democratic Transition in Malaga, one of the few publications that allow us to know some passages in the history of this illegal raffle.
“Each one played the amount they wanted and the vendor wrote down the number chosen and the amount, giving only a piece of paper with the requested number and the indicated bet. They used the drawing of the blind, who from time to time raised their protests to the government authority…”, the operation of the game was explained.
Its scope was such that in 1979, the aforementioned work includes, the socialist deputy for Malaga Carlos Sanjuán asked the Government about the measures it intended to adopt to put an end to it. Three years later, in June 1982, ONCE vendors in Malaga began an 18-day strike to protest against La Rápida, unable to compete with it.
The coupon holders estimated the daily sales of the rapideros at 30 million pesetas -180,000 euros-, while theirs did not reach two million -12,000 euros-. The illegals, they said, had five vendors for every one of the ONCE. Malaga had gone from being the fifth delegation with the most sales to one of the last due to the unstoppable rise of La Rápida. For every ten pesetas played (six euro cents) they offered a prize of 6,000 (36 euros) compared to the 3,500 pesetas (21 euros) given by ONCE. The “godfathers” of the illegal lottery, reported the press, had never been discovered.
And so the leaders of La Rápida have continued for decades, operating with impunity in clandestinity, until in December 2014 the National Police put a name and face to the current gyrfalcon of the illegal raffle for the first time. From the man, from Malaga, 64 years old at the time, the agents attached to the Area of ??Games and Public Shows of the Junta de Andalucía seized 10,143 tickets and discovered that he had at least nine distributors to whom he paid 20% commission.
In 2016 they hunted him down again: this time with 163,000 tickets and seven collectors and 36 vendors under his command. The godfather, as on the previous occasion, was proposed for a very serious offense against the Gambling Law of the Autonomous Community, which provides for penalties of between 10,001 and 300,000 euros.
The agents in charge of the case do not know the amount of the sanctions imposed on him or whether he paid them, but they do know that La Rápida continued to circulate. Proof of this is that last February they detected some of their sellers again. “We identified 7 or 8 and we followed them up until they took us to the ringleader and the collectors. In March we decided to go into the headquarters where they had everything,” says Juan Miguel Jiménez, the chief inspector of the Games and Public Shows Area that has been at the forefront of the investigation.
The vendors took them to a house in Las Campanillas, a neighborhood on the outskirts of Malaga where La Rápida is very popular. At the bottom they found the ringleader -the same man, for the third time-, 88,000 tickets where the sellers write down in pen what number the buyer wants to play and how much, calculators, cash, prize lists… One can play , for example, 1 euro or 1,000 because the ONCE draw of the day will end in 125 and agree on the prize in case of success. If it is a big bet, the seller first calls the ringleader to ask for his approval.
In other words, the septuagenarian who elegantly dressed in a shirt, vest and hat -to match his high standard of living, which includes high-end vehicles- kindly received the Police when they knocked on his door. As on previous occasions, he was very kind and cooperative and made it easy for the agents to search. “After analyzing the documentation, we calculate that he gets a minimum of 250,000 clean euros a year, but it’s sure to be more. I would say 500,000 and up. They don’t pay taxes, they don’t pay the Treasury or Social Security… No pay nothing,” says Inspector Jiménez.
According to the data handled by the gaming sector, La Rápida could sell around 800,000 euros a year in tickets, especially in Malaga and Cádiz. It is one of the most popular illegal lotteries, but by no means the only one or the one that moves the most money. Only in Andalusia do at least ONDEE -heir to the old OID (Organization for the Disabled, now closed)-, Papeletas Blancas, La Paloma, El Numerito, Orda, Anda, Mae, Discade, Pyda and Aganey operate. It is estimated that between all of them they have 134 sellers and total sales of 5.6 million euros. Andalusia is the community where the most illegal games operate and where people spend the most on them, since it absorbs 44% of the national sales of these clandestine raffles.
It is estimated that in all of Spain they move about 12.5 million euros, an amount much lower than that of a decade ago, when they totaled 84 million euros in sales. In the list of communities most fond of illegal gambling, Andalusia is followed by Castilla-La Mancha (1.7 million euros), the Valencian Community (1.5 million) and the Canary Islands (1.3).
“It is an activity that must be pursued and eradicated. Many times the public has no notion that it is illegal because they use our lottery, the ONCE lottery, and many use it to sell it to people with disabilities,” says Cristóbal Martínez, delegate of the ONCE in Andalusia.
Helping people with disabilities was precisely the hook of the so-called “disabled coupon”, an illegal lottery dismantled by the Civil Guard in March 2022 in Vigo after running for more than a decade. The family business had been started by the father and, when he died, his wife, 73, and her daughter, 49, had taken it over. More than 300,000 illegal coupons and some 30,000 equally false scratch cards were seized. The sellers had no contract or social protection and received in exchange for a minimal commission. The same precariousness with which the distributors of La Rápida work. “They are people who do not have financial means, who are unemployed, or retirees who earn a bonus of about 40-50 euros on average per day,” explains inspector Juan Miguel Jiménez.
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