A man has died following a brutal bludgeoning by North African migrants in a small Spanish village. The attack is said to have been retaliation by the migrants against 39-year-old David Lledó for defending a minor girl from being sexually harassed by them.
The incident occurred on June 22 in the small Mediterranean coastal community of Gata de Gorgos in Alicante. The community has a population of just 6,000 residents. Witnesses report that the assault on Lledó occurred in the blink of an eye, leaving the man with no time to even attempt to escape or defend himself.
Local police officers found the victim “in cardiorespiratory arrest with various injuries to the torso, face, and neck.” According to Levante, the first to attend to the victim was the town’s doctor, who lives on the same street where the attack took place.
The emergency medical teams continued to try and resuscitate Lledó, but were unsuccessful.
Following the attack, the Guardia Civil arrested three men of Moroccan origin, of whom only one has been remanded to custody. Another has been released under the condition he surrender his passport, while the third has been unconditionally released.
The man accused of issuing the blow that murdered Lledó has been identified in the media only as Mohamed, and it is confirmed that he was known to police as a repeat offender who had already spent several months in prison in Catalonia.
Mohamed had reportedly been involved in numerous altercations around Alicante, with some victims refusing to file police reports out of fear of retaliation. The man was always accompanied by several other migrants, and the group managed to sow considerable unrest in the municipality within a short time of their arrival.
Even the local Islamic community was reportedly aware of Mohamed and his North African gang, and had warned the authorities that “some very dangerous people had entered the town.”
Until recently, locals in the small community had considered the area so safe that it was uncommon for residents to even lock the doors to their homes. All of that changed with the arrival of the North African migrants.
At the time of the attack, the aggressors were squatting in a luxurious two-story villa with a swimming pool in a nearby residential housing development. The men destroyed the new villa, breaking windows and leaving garbage everywhere.
Speaking to Spanish media, a young man from the village said that the attack was inevitable, and that everyone in the community had anticipated something like this would happen.
“The worst of it all is that you could see it coming for weeks,” the man said. “They were behaving aggressively, chasing girls and fighting every day.”
The murder has been tied to the migrants sexually harassing several women and girls in the community. According to Lledó’s partner, he had attempted to confront Mohamed and his compatriots for cat calling and intimidating a 15-year-old girl. Lledó’s intervention had allowed the young girl to escape safely.
Days later, Mohamed attacked Lledó with a baseball bat while his back was turned.
Despite the horrific crime, Lledó’s family has issued statements condemning any racist sentiment towards migrants, and even condemned a local rally in memory of Lledó during which some residents criticized the migration scheme that had allowed the Moroccans to enter the community.
The City Council of Gata, led by Compromís, an environmentalist left-wing political party, declared three days of official mourning for Lledó, in which all public and festive acts have been suspended, and sports facilities and municipal spaces have been closed.
