The Tarragona Court will try six people accused of killing a man and covering up the murder that occurred in the early hours of August 26, 2021 in the Tarragona capital. The public ministry claims that they took advantage of their numerical superiority to attack the victim with knives and axes, who died as a result of his injuries.
Hours later, those investigated placed the body in the trunk of a car to throw it into the Ebro River, between La Ràpita and Sant Jaume d’Enveja. At a checkpoint, agents from the Tarragona Urban Police found the amputated hand that they had forgotten to take away. The Prosecutor’s Office requests 25 years in prison for two of the accused for a crime of murder and for the other four involved it requests three years in prison for concealment.
As described in the prosecution’s indictment, the accused were on the night of August 25, 2021 and in the early hours of the 26th at an address located on the Viladegats road in Tarragona, where they resided. On the same property, there was also a small house where the victim, a 23-year-old man, lived, with whom they maintained a friendly relationship that had become “conflictive” weeks before the events. The prosecutor explains that at 5:26 a.m. on August 26, one of the defendants called the emergency services to alert that he had a problem with a neighbor, but that five minutes later he called again to say that police intervention was no longer necessary, since the neighbor had asked for forgiveness and they had resolved the problem.
Thus, once the police action was annulled, the investigator made several calls through the cell phone of another of the accused to ask for help to two friends. “At 8:08 a.m., they returned one of the calls to the accused, who answered that he had already solved the problem,” the accusatory document states. The prosecutor also reports that between five and eight in the morning, those involved in the murder went to the victim’s booth, “carrying knives and axes with the intention of causing his death and taking advantage of the null possibilities of defense, since they came when he was resting and taking advantage of his numerical superiority. In addition, he adds, he stabbed him several times in the head, cut his body and also “cut off” his hand while he was still “alive, with a very sharp knife.”
“All the injuries that the defendants caused to the victim were intended to deliberately and inhumanely increase his suffering, beyond what was necessary to cause his death,” the public ministry argues.
The prosecutor also details that the victim suffered “multiple serious traumatic injuries to the cephalic pole”, injuries to the lumbar area, as well as the “complete” amputation of his left hand, among others.
“These multiple craniofacial traumas with an open burst fracture of the cranial vault, brain laceration and destruction of vital centers led to the death of the victim in the early hours of August 26, 2021,” it indicates.
The Prosecutor’s Office reports that the accused met to “eliminate” evidence of the murder and “avoid the action of justice.” Thus, part of the group bought bleach and smoked salt in a bazaar in the Sant Pere and Sant Pau neighborhood of Tarragona and returned to the farm to clean the area of ??the house and the plot, with gloves and plastic bags in their shoes. “Subsequently, they placed the body in a bag that they tied with ropes and loaded it into the vehicle, property of one of the accused,” the public ministry emphasizes. Immediately afterwards, three of those investigated left with the lifeless body towards La Ràpita, where another of the accused joined them, to whom they showed the body. Then the four defendants went to a canal of the Ebro River, located between La Ràpita and Sant Jaume d’Enveja, where they “disposed” of the body, but “forgot” the amputated hand, which remained in the trunk.
Once they threw the body into the river, the four accused met up with the rest of those involved in a hotel in La Pineda. Around 8:30 p.m. on the day of the events, agents from the Tarragona Urban Police stopped the vehicle at the intersection between Jaume I and Felip Pedrell streets because they committed a traffic violation.
During the search of the car, they located the amputated hand and detained them. Two of the accused have been in provisional prison since August 29, 2021, while the rest were granted provisional release months after their arrest, between October 2021 and January 2022.
For all these reasons, the public ministry considers that the facts constitute a crime of murder and another of concealment. For the first crime, he requests 25 years in prison for two of the accused, while for the second, three years in prison for the other four investigated. Regarding civil liability, he requests compensation of 120,000 euros for each of his closest relatives, specifically for the victim’s parents and siblings.
