The companions of the man fatally stabbed on the night of July 1, 2020 in Santa Coloma de Gramanet (Barcelonès Nord) assure that the victim could not do anything to defend himself. This is what his brother and a friend of his have declared in the jury that is being held at the Barcelona Court.
The aggressor stabbed the man up to seven times with a large knife, causing his instant death in the Plaza de la Vila, while a second man also seriously injured the brother with two stab wounds. However, they did not attack the friend who was accompanying them, and he assured that they were attacked without the victim being able to avoid the attack despite trying to do so with an iron bar. The prosecution is asking for 15 and 8 years in prison, respectively.
This Thursday, Gabriel López, brother of Carlos -the deceased victim-, and Isidro Vidal, a friend who accompanied them at the time of the events, as well as witnesses and agents of the Mossos d’Esquadra who participated in the collection of statements and in the practice of proceedings. According to the men, that night the three of them had a Moorish skewer sandwich for dinner and later, around 11:00 p.m., they went to the Plaza de la Vila, where they smoked a cigarette with drugs, according to the story that has been made public. to a Mossos agent in the session.
At this point, they ran into the alleged perpetrator of the fatal attack, Juan Carlos, and another man who had attacked the brother with a machete, Manuel L. but known by the nickname Charlie, both residents of an occupied premises where they formerly there had been a jewelry store. According to the victim’s brother, the attackers approached them to ask if they had been at the premises that afternoon.
The witnesses detail that both went back to the premises and returned to where the men were. “One of them was carrying a knife with seven springs,” said the companion, Isidro Vidal, while the other man was carrying a large machete.
The victim ordered the brother to walk away down some nearby stairs, but his attacker, Juan Carlos, took advantage of the fact that he was unarmed to hold him back. “He stabbed him at least seven times, he was blinded, Carlos couldn’t defend himself,” says Vidal.
In this sense, the brother insists that the victim could not do anything, because he had a 36% physical disability, and it was then that they also attacked him: “Charlie tried to stick the knife in my neck but I was in time to stop him.” push me away, and then he stabbed me in the side,” says the brother, Gabriel.
The shouting caused some neighbors to go out onto their balconies, as well as the owner of a restaurant next to the scene. In his story, they detailed that they saw the aggressor and another man return to the occupied premises, where another older man was waiting for them. They did not leave there until the next day, when the Mossos entered the old jewelry store with the judge’s order and located three weapons, one of them the alleged murder weapon, hidden under a tile that was covered by a stove. Under a bed they located the machete.
While the victim was fatally bleeding at the scene, some pedestrians found the badly injured brother and notified the emergency services, who took him to the Germans Trias y Pujol hospital in Badalona. There he had to undergo emergency surgery for a gastric perforation of the tail of the pancreas and the spleen, and he had serious consequences, according to what he said, which forced him to undergo surgery again last August.
For all these reasons, the prosecution is asking for Juan Carlos to be sentenced to 15 years in prison for the crime of homicide, while for the aggressor of the brother who survived, the defendant known by the nickname Charlie, he is asking for 8 years for homicide in degree of attempt. The jury will resume next Monday, with the analysis of the different reports prepared from the evidence and witnesses collected.
