Marin Eugen Sabau, a preventive prisoner who suffered a spinal cord injury after starring in a shooting in Tarragona in December, will be able to go ahead with euthanasia.
The head of the Tarragona Investigating Court 5, Sònia Zapater, has decided that the process initiated by the man known as the Tarragona gunman should not be interrupted, according to a court order accessed by EL PAÍS.
The accusation -exercising the Prosecutor's Office and those injured during the incident- had asked to stop euthanasia so that justice is done.
But the judge rejects it because the "fundamental right" to freedom and to decide on life and death prevails and because the Euthanasia Law does not provide for the intervention of judges in any case.
In parallel, the magistrate has agreed to Sabau's request to declare as investigated.
She will do it next Monday.
Sabau, 46, has been in provisional prison since last December for a shooting that left four injured.
The man had worked as a security guard at Securitas and wanted revenge for the "hell" to which his bosses had allegedly subjected him.
He announced his intentions hours before in various emails: “I am going to 'vaccinate' the heads of Securitas,” he said.
On December 14, he entered the offices of Tarragona disguised with a wig, took out a long gun and, after a brief talk, began to shoot.
They were five minutes of horror that EL PAÍS reconstructed with the images from the security cameras.
Three employees were seriously injured.
He then fled by car;
persecuted, shot a
mosso
who was wounded in the arm.
He then barricaded himself in an abandoned farmhouse in Riudoms.
He was surrounded.
The agents tried to negotiate with him to no avail.
He had already warned: “If the police corner me, things will end badly, they won't catch me alive.
I'll shoot myself in the head."
He fired at the officers, who fired back.
He was left in critical condition.
Marin Eugen Sabau is transferred on a stretcher after being injured by the Mosos d'Esquadra in a farmhouse in Maspujols (Tarragona), in 2021. Fabián Acidres (Europa Press)
The prison hospital in Terrassa (Barcelona) has since housed the gunman awaiting trial.
He is being investigated for attempted murder, assault on authority and illegal possession of weapons.
Sabau requested that euthanasia be administered.
On June 16, the director of the hospital sent a letter to the court to report that he had agreed to the request to initiate the process under the Organic Law approved last March.
According to the medical team, the man “initially meets the requirements to undergo said process,” the car indicates.
A few days later, the lawyer of the injured Mosso requested that the process be paralyzed because there was a judicial process underway and the victims had to be answered.
The Prosecutor's Office adhered to the request, which has now been rejected.
In an unprecedented decision, the judge has ruled that "it is not appropriate to agree to the cessation or interruption" of the process initiated by Sabau.
In other words, euthanasia must go ahead.
The main argument of an unprecedented order is, precisely, that the judge can say nothing on this matter, because the Euthanasia Law "does not attribute any competence to decide on the euthanasia process."
That decision, according to the regulations, corresponds to the responsible doctors and to the verification carried out by the Guarantee and Evaluation Commission.
"There is no legal provision that allows a judge to interfere in a process that is specifically regulated in an organic law insofar as it affects fundamental rights," she stresses.
a basic right
The text states that neither the Prosecutor's Office nor the accusation of the Mossos "clearly state what would be the regulatory protection for the decision they request", that is, interrupt the euthanasia process so that the criminal case against Sabau can continue.
There is also no risk of escape, says the judge, because it is neutralized with his death, with which the other great argument of the accusations declines.
The judge asserts that there is a clash of rights, but not a "collision of fundamental rights", since the right to physical and moral integrity, dignity and freedom are above the right to effective judicial protection, which protects among others, to the victims.
They are not her, she insists her, comparable rights.
The right to decide on one's own death “has priority due to its proximity to the core of life”.
And “subjective” distinctions cannot be made based on the “life trajectory” requested by the measure.
In the case of Sabau, she concludes, "the victims' right to a fair trial" has been guaranteed, which "in no way should be interpreted as a right to punishment."
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