Judge jails off-duty Police officer who shot terrace intruder
The Benidorm judge in charge of the case of a man who was shot dead by an off-duty police officer during the early hours of Saturday morning remanded the 29 year old man in custody after a preliminary court hearing yesterday during which the officer admitted firing the fatal shot.
The judge is trying to establish why the officer, who was found at the scene with a stab wound to his chest, delayed for around an hour and a half before reporting the incident, which occurred at 2.30am when the victim first entered the officer's home on Benidorm's Avenida Beniardà.
The autopsy on the dead man - David, a 32 year old metalworker from Madrid - will be carried out today.
A friend of the victim explained that David had arrived in Benidorm by coach on Friday evening to spend a few days with a group of friends who had rented an apartment in the popular resort.
The same source explained that at around 2am on Saturday morning, David, who was only wearing a pair of swimming trunks, climbed onto the terrace of an adjoining seventh-floor flat in the building next door after downing a number of beers and several shorts. The last time his friends, who tried repeatedly to persuade him to return to the flat where the party was taking place, saw David alive was when they saw him gesticulating to them from inside the off-duty police officer's flat.
No details about the case have been released by the police and the judge handling the case has imposed a secrecy order. The Policeman who fired the fatal shot, later admitted that he had stabbed himself in an attempt to cover up his action.