A judge in Reus has brought two Mossos d’Esquadra officers one step away from trial who on December 14, 2021, had the difficult task of neutralizing a gunman in Tarragona. In an order reported by Cadena SER and also accessed by La Vanguardia, the instructor considers that their actions were disproportionate.
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Marin Eugen Sabau showed up at 11:17 a.m. at his former workplace, the offices of the company Securitas Direct. He pulled out a gun and fired at several workers, injuring three people with gunshots. He then fled in his vehicle until a patrol stopped him at a roundabout on the T-11 road in Tarragona. When the officers ordered him to surrender, he responded by opening fire and wounded one of the police officers in the arm.
However, the action for which two officers are now being prosecuted occurred afterward. Fleeing in his Citroën Xsara, Sabau barricaded himself in an isolated farmhouse in Riudoms. The Mossos deployed the negotiators unit and the Special Intervention Group (GEI). The gunman remained sheltered behind a stone wall. When the officers positioned themselves about 20 meters from him and identified themselves as police, Sabau turned and fired twice.
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It was then that one of the Mossos fired a total of 17 shots to neutralize him. The judge states that this action “exceeded the purpose of neutralization” and involved an “absolute disregard” for Sabau’s physical integrity, whom, according to the order, “was fired upon indiscriminately.”
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The gunman was neutralized and taken to the hospital alive, although he suffered spinal injuries that resulted in a total loss of mobility. In June 2022, he requested euthanasia, a procedure that was granted and carried out two months later, in August of the same year.
Before starting that morning of violence, the attacker sent a letter to several of his former bosses warning them of what he was going to do. “I will confront everyone who wants to harm me. Whoever looks for me will find me. If the police corner me and I have hostages, things will end badly for them. The police will be responsible. I am 100% sure they will not catch me alive. I will shoot myself in the head before the authorities get me. Don’t let the police or the Mossos d’Esquadra say they killed me, because that will be a lie. I know they like to take credit.”
The court in Reus is prosecuting two GEI officers while dismissing the case against eight other Mossos who also participated in the operation to neutralize the gunman. However, the magistrate highlights that Sabau “fired five times, of which only one, or at most two, were aimed at the officers,” including one of those now prosecuted. This officer responded “with a number of shots that, at least, exceeded by eight times those fired by the target,” the judge emphasizes in his ruling.
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