Costa Blanca
Twenty two murders in Alicante province last year
By m.p.
Jan 1, 2008 - 12:29 PM

2007 was a tragic year for Alicante, with a total of 22 murders in the province. Looking back on the year just gone, La Verdad newspaper said five of the victims were killed in Alicante City, and five were women who died as the victims of domestic violence.

One which received extensive coverage in the media, was the case of Svetlana Orlova, a 30 year old woman from Russia who was stabbed by her ex boyfriend in Alicante City on 18th November, and died in hospital the following day. The attack came just a few days after Svetlana and her attacker, Ricardo Navarro, appeared on the popular Antena 3 show, Diario de Patricia, where she turned down her ex’s public plea to restart their relationship.

Some of the murders remain unsolved. One is the case of the Partido Popular Mayor of Polop de la Marina, Alejandro Ponsoda, who died eight days after he was shot outside his home in Xirles last October. He had been Partido Popular Mayor of the town since 1995.

And in Paredón, near Pinoso, a British pensioner, 74 year old Janette May Grocutt, was murdered at her home on 9th November. A suspect from Belgium was arrested in Yecla, in the neighbouring Murcia Region, the following Monday, and was remanded to custody without bail.

There was meanwhile a verdict last year for the death in 2004 of 41 year old Karen Durrel from Essex, where her boyfriend, Paul Durant, aged 47, and also from Britain, admitted to her manslaughter and was jailed for 12 years in a plea bargain deal in the Alicante provincial court in November. Originally charged with murder, it was the first murder case which came to court in the Valencia Region without a body being found.

Durant had previously told a British newspaper that he had chopped up his girlfriend and eaten parts of her body before disposing of it in plastic bags around Calpe. He said in the letter that he killed her after receiving messages from God on the television, but denied his original claim in court.

Alejandro Ponsoda, the Mayor of Polop de la Marina who died after he was shot outside his home in Xirles last October. Archive photo – EFE.