Beny died in an ambush between solar panels in Plasencia de Jalón (Zaragoza) | Spain

Just a few days ago, the crime in a solar panel field that shocked the province of Zaragoza on December 2 has ceased to be in the shadows. Francisco H., 29 years old, known as Bathlost his life in a mountain area within the small municipality of Plasencia de Jalón, with 325 inhabitants and located about 40 kilometers west of the capital. Some neighbors found his body early in the morning, half burned, in a place that was difficult to access and where there were hardly any witnesses. His car, an old Ford Mondeo station wagon model, was not far away, about 600 meters away, hidden behind some bushes and completely burned. With the arrest of three men from the Valdejalón region on March 12, some light has begun to shed light on a death about which there are still unknowns.

At the beginning of this week, and when the judge had already sent the three arrested to provisional prison, the Civil Guard reported on this investigation at a press conference in Zaragoza. Although part of the case is still secret and, therefore, they could not go into details, they explained how the crime occurred and exposed some of the seized weapons to those arrested.

There, Lieutenant Colonel Óscar Vergara said that Beny did not lose his life in the place where they found him, known as the area of ​​La Lomaza, but that he was taken there when he had already died after being shot several times. Because of the way it ended, he maintained that there was “a clear intention” to take his life. “We are civil guards, not jurists,” the researcher clarified. “Due to the level of cruelty, we have thought that it is a murder,” Vergara said.

The victim had met two of the detainees the day before, whom he knew. The family said that they were friends and were trying to close a deal for the sale of an animal, say sources familiar with the investigation. They went to a road in the municipality, where a chase began in which he ended up receiving several shots in the back. The forensic report indicated other injuries that had occurred after death, such as a blow to the head or knife cuts to the face.

At the moment, the crime is being investigated as a homicide, although this does not prevent, according to the judge handling the case, it from being considered a murder later, as already contemplated by the Public Prosecutor’s Office. The judge, head of seat No. 2 of the Court of Instance of La Almunia, sent the three detainees to provisional detention last Saturday: Rafael GC, alias Pato53 years old, Salvador GG, 37 years old, and José GH, 23 years old. A group of the victim’s relatives scolded one of them outside the police precinct, when the officers were taking him to the courthouse. “Coward, unfortunate man. Couldn’t you fight one against one?” they shouted at him. The three people involved are residents of the area and have a history of common crimes. The instructor considered that there were “sufficient reasons to consider them—each of them—criminally responsible” for Beny’s death. None of them testified in court.

The main hypothesis of his death is that his life was taken due to a financial or drug debt. However, due to the cruelty he suffered, other reasons that have to do with some type of personal quarrel have not been ruled out. It is still being investigated whether there are more people who covered up the three arrested.

During the investigation, dubbed operation Heliosenciain reference to the Greek god of the sun and the municipality in which the crime occurred, the Civil Guard agents had to appease the desire for justice of the deceased’s relatives. They convinced them that they would use all means to find the perpetrators, so that they would be legally tried and “no more misfortune would occur,” the lieutenant colonel said on Monday.

Since December 2, researchers began long-term work. The examination of the area where Beny’s body was found lasted for weeks. They mapped the terrain with drones, emptied a nearby pond due to the suspicion that the murder weapon could be there, recovered the deceased’s phone and had traces of DNA found on the victim’s clothing that had not been burned to be analyzed. In parallel, they interviewed relatives and people with whom the deceased contacted that day and reconstructed his last night alive.

After Beny’s death, two of the detained suspects left the region. One of them was “self-exiled” for a month and a half, but returned and returned to his routines. Another settled with his family in Paterna (Valencia), where he was arrested. The third remained in the area, living a normal life.

The investigations reached their peak on March 12, when the three suspects were arrested in Paterna (Valencia), Lumpiaque (Zaragoza) and Sabiñánigo (Huesca) during an operation with high security measures. The dangerousness of one of them caused the Special Intervention Unit (UEI), made up of agents who are experts in high-risk operations, to go to his home. In the five searches, the agents found “relevant indications of the participation of the detainees in the murder.”

The police operation seized a large number of weapons. Among them there was a 12-gauge shotgun and different ammunition, detonating short weapons (which simulate real fire) and other airsoft (which shoot plastic projectiles), whose aesthetics and weight could make them easily confused with real firearms, in addition to a large number of edged weapons, including machetes.

Two of those arrested are being investigated, in addition to homicide, for illegal possession of weapons, and a third has added drug trafficking, since a package with 50 grams of methamphetamine stored in the refrigerator and 1.2 kilos of marijuana buds, as well as wrappers and other utensils, such as zip ties, were seized in his home to distribute the drug in doses. Following the latest actions, investigators have sent the seized weapons to be analyzed to see if they match those used against the victim.