The Provincial Court of Santa Cruz de Tenerife has found José J. guilty of the murder of a man on February 21, 2023, in an apartment located in Tabaiba, within the municipality of El Rosario, following a decision by a jury.
Furthermore, the convicted individual is ordered to pay €153,600 to the family of the deceased, named Rubén, who had visited the home of another man, identified in the verdict as the one who orchestrated the murder and ended Rubén’s life the following day.
The jury determined that a third defendant was not guilty, a ruling that will be contested by the convicted man’s defence team and the relatives of the deceased, who oppose his acquittal.
The jury established that the two defendants were in the apartment at around 5:30 in the afternoon. While one is responsible for the direct act that led to Rubén’s death, the other believed they were there to collect a debt related to a cocaine transaction, as had occurred on previous occasions.
The conviction is supported by CCTV footage from the building, a pharmacy, and a nearby supermarket, which captured the defendants and the victim arriving at the property at separate times, with all three exiting together—yet without Rubén.
They also turned off their mobile phones simultaneously as soon as they arrived in Tabaiba, despite having communicated with each other several times throughout the day.
The jury determined that, once inside the apartment, they began assaulting Rubén on the head, resulting in multiple severe injuries and his immediate death. The body exhibited significant skull fractures, indicating that survival would have been impossible even had the incident occurred in a medical facility.
Both suspects were apprehended after a handwritten note was discovered from the individual who took his own life a day later, which named them while absolving them of the crime—testimony that was deemed untrustworthy by investigators.
