Carles Puigdemont illegally declared independence for the Spanish province he was leading, and then fled to Belgium a wanted man.
Seven years later, this August, he snuck back into Catalonia, where police were expecting him to surrender.
Except, when they weren't looking, he again vanished — this time in a getaway car allegedly arranged by three off-duty cops.
The former Catalan president has long been wanted by Spanish authorities.
The central government in Madrid views him as a seditious rebel, after he declared Catalonia independent following an unrecognised, illegal 2017 referendum.
He fled to Brussels and not long afterwards the government imposed direct rule over the wealthy, ostensibly autonomous region, which makes up about a fifth of the Spanish economy.
An arrest warrant on embezzlement charges was also issued for Puigdemont — because the cost of the independence referendum was charged to Catalonia's treasury.
But he returned, and gave police the slip after speaking at a rally not far from the court that had ordered his arrest.
According to the police and government officials, who failed to nab him while he was openly walking about as a fugitive back from exile, there was an orchestrated plan.
Part of the crowd of about 2,000 who had turned out to hear him speak were in on it, and hoodwinked the officers who had been tracking him, waiting for the best moment to make their arrest.
Puigdemont didn't reveal many details, just that he had a plan "to speak at the event, evade unlawful arrest and leave Spain".
Puigdemont outlines return plans
The latest chapter in Puigdemont's Catalonia caper centred around an event held by his political party in central Barcelona, as he said, "to welcome my return".
It was hardly a secret.
In a four-page letter dated August 3, written from his exile base in Waterloo, Brussels, Puigdemont openly detailed his plans to return to Catalonia for a parliamentary debate between candidates hoping to take his old job as president.
"Just as going into exile was a political decision, returning from it is as well," he wrote.
It's not clear how he entered Barcelona, but two days after arriving, he made his way to the Arc de Triomf, where supporters had gathered.
"I was able to cross some streets and reach the stage without being seized," he said.
"And I was able to speak with my face uncovered, a few meters from the seat of the High Court of Justice of Catalonia and the parliament itself, in front of a crowd."
With Puigdemont's return expected, Catalonia's regional police had deployed 500 officers across the region to swoop on him.
But with a large crowd gathered, and Puigdemont being escorted to the stage by president of the Catalan parliament, officers decided against moving on him at that moment to avoid any confrontation and "public disorder", police said.
"With more than 2,000 people around, going in there and arresting Puigdemont would have caused a public order problem and we have to avoid that at all costs," a police union spokesperson said.
"We had to look for the right moment to arrest him."
They thought that would be when he marched towards the Catalan parliament.
"Police had cordoned off the whole area, making it impossible," Puigdemont said.
"If I had tried, it would have been tantamount to surrendering to the judicial authorities."
The Catalonian straw hat ruse
The official version of events has Puigdemont walking backstage as soon as he finished his speech.
He then donned a straw hat, ducked behind a tent, and slid into a parked car, said Eduard Sallent, chief commissioner of Catalan regional police Mossos d'Esquadra.
Police rushed towards the car to stop it before it could speed away.
They came close.
But about two metres from the car, officers were blocked by about 50 people all wearing straw hats like the one Puigdemont had put on as he rushed off stage.
Police then lost track of the getaway car, Chief Sallent said.
That kicked off a formidable effort to find Puigdemont.
All of Catalonia was locked down for a few hours.
Police were on the lookout at airports and train stations, and there were major traffic delays as authorities blocked highways and searched vehicles.
"It was an operation that failed in its objective of arresting Puigdemont, which can be defined as a mistake, but we weren't made to look like fools," Chief Sallent said.
However, it has since emerged via a report leaked to Spanish media, that the only plan police had was to arrest Puigdemont when he essentially surrendered by going to parliament, where he knew officers would be waiting to take him into custody.
It was also revealed that a police drone that had been tracking Puigdemont lost him as he entered the getaway car, and that officers had been slammed with bogus information about his whereabouts shortly after his escape.
"That Mr Puigdemont returned to Spain and then fled was not contemplated as a possibility," Chief Sallent reportedly wrote in letter in the leaked report.
It also turns out Puigdemont likely had help from police insiders.
Cop's car used to escape
The straw hat distraction was the first part of the plan to help Puigdemont evade authorities, but he still needed to leave quickly.
To do so, he leaned on some rogue officers who had remained loyal, according to various reports and a Catalan government source.
"We have a problem with that group, and we knew it," the source told Reuters.
A wheelchair was loaded into the front of a car owned by one of those officers, so it could be parked in a disabled spot without raising suspicion.
After Puigdemont finished his speech and moved into position, the car came from an underground car park, and he hopped inside.
"I didn't return to Catalonia to be arrested," he said.
Initially, police were looking into whether Puigdemont had hidden in the boot of the car to hide as he was rushed out of Barcelona while authorities intensified efforts to find him.
Puigdemont said he didn't even need to bother.
"There was no need to hide in the trunk of a car — as they claim I did. I sat in the back of a private vehicle and was driven across the border," he said.
On Monday, three officers accused of helping Puigdemont vanish were detained, including the owner of the getaway car.
Days after the fiasco in Barcelona, Puigdemont claimed to have returned to his exile base in Belgium.
"I'm in Waterloo after extremely difficult days," he wrote on X.
Chief Sallent wasn't convinced.
"I do not rule out that this man is still in Barcelona," he said.
"I have no objective evidence that Mr Puigdemont is in Belgium, rather, I think that is what they want me to believe and we do not work with assumptions, much less with statements from interested parties."
