Spain: Gunman left paralysed in police shootout euthanised before trial

Victims wanted him to be sentenced first

Marin Eugen Sabau died on 24 August, 2022. (Handout)

A man who shot and injured three work colleagues and a police officer in Spain last year has died from euthanasia before he could face trial.

Marin Eugen Sabau attacked his workmates at a security company in the northeast city of Tarragona in December 2021, before he holed himself up in a house and had a shootout with the police.

During the gun battle, the 46-year-old, who wounded one of the officers, was shot in the spine, leaving him partially paralysed.

“I am paraplegic,” Sabau said in his appeal to receive euthanasia. “I can’t move my left arm well. I wear screws and I don’t feel my chest,” he added.

Under a Spanish law introduced last June, adults with “serious or incurable” illnesses which bring “unbearable suffering” can choose to have euthanasia.

Sabau’s death on Tuesday was a disappointment for his victims, who unsuccessfully sought to have his euthanasia postponed until after he had been sentenced.

“It was not about preventing euthanasia, but we did want the victims to have a fair trial,” their lawyer José Natonio Bitos said, according to the Spanish daily El País.

A Spanish court refused their request, saying it had no right to interfere in Sabau’s request for euthanasia.

In the first year of the new law, at least 172 people died from euthanasia.