The paranoid schizophrenia suffered by a British citizen who has acknowledged being the author of his father’s death after stabbing him 54 times will be a key element in the jury trial that is being held starting this Friday at the Santa Cruz de Tenerife Court.
The defendant has suffered from this ailment since he was 18 years old and has a recognized disability of 67%.
Thus, it remains to be determined to what extent the defendant’s illness had an influence in this case of parricide, for which he was being treated and which at the time even led him to believe that he was an apostle.
The defendant had arrived in Los Abrigos, in Granadilla de Abona, from the Malaga town of Estepona, where he lived with his mother, precisely because she perceived that his illness had worsened in recent times and, for example, when he asked him a question he responded with soliloquies.
Since the pandemic was in full swing, he could not go to his psychiatrist’s office in person, but the psychiatrist recommended to the mother that her son not travel and that he increase the medication to control the outbreaks.
In Tenerife, his father had a company dedicated to gardening in which the son began to work, as he had previously done for short periods of time.
There was a good relationship between them and nothing suggested what happened at six in the morning on July 1, 2020.
The night before, it seems that an argument had arisen between the two because the son did not want to wash the dishes and, driven by anger, ended up attacking his father, into whom he stabbed a 15-centimeter-long knife 54 times.
Death was immediate because the first stab wounds were directed to the heart.
He dealt others in the arms, which appear to be due to the victim’s attempts to parry the attack, and then more than 40 when he was on his back on the ground without the possibility of defending himself.
The prosecutor in the case asks for 300,000 euros in compensation and that the accused remain in prison for 21 years and another ten on probation subjected to psychological treatment.
It maintains the aggravating factors of having acted treasonously, and, therefore, with treachery, and special cruelty or cruelty.
The representative of the Public Ministry advanced that the testimony of the expert specialist in psychiatry that will be heard in the next few days will be essential when determining to what extent the disease affected him in his way of acting.
The prosecutor considers that it was to a “minimal” degree and that he was aware of what he was doing. She concludes that she is dealing with a murder and not a homicide, as the private prosecution and defense maintain.
The lawyer who represents the two other brothers, since the eldest had committed suicide in 2016 also due to this same ailment, reported that they have reached an agreement before a notary public that the defendant give them his part of the inheritance that amounts to about 86,000 euros to cover civil liability.
The lawyer agrees with most of the account made by the Prosecutor’s Office but limits confinement in a center to ten years and then another five under the supervision of a guardian. In addition, he adds that the mishap originated from a worsening of the ailment but he qualifies that death occurred almost painlessly because the first stab wounds were fatal out of necessity and he believes that it was a homicide.
The defense recalled that his client had attempted suicide on many occasions with an overdose of pills and stressed that the relationship with the father had always been “very good”.
Therefore, given his mental condition, he rules out that he can be held responsible for what happened and that this condition must be addressed as a complete defense that makes his imputation impossible.
He maintains that by renouncing his part of the inheritance in favor of his mother and siblings, civil liability is covered and that he should not remain admitted to a mental center for more than seven years and then be under the supervision of a person who accepts this responsibility. .
The defense has no doubt that the accused was unaware of what he did and defines him as “a very hard-working boy” who every so often traveled to Tenerife to see his father, work in his father’s company and then delivered the money to his mother.
Although the perpetrator of the death is clear, over the next week a long series of witnesses and experts have been summoned.
For example, the workers of the father’s company who were the first to find the body and speak with the defendant.
The mother, the father’s sentimental partner, police officers and various experts, especially those related to mental illnesses, will also testify.
