The suspect in the fatal stabbing of an American tourist during a robbery in Cascais has been placed in pre-trial detention. The coercive measures were announced this Friday.
The fatal stabbing occurred in the early hours of Wednesday, around 3:20 AM. Later that same day, the Public Security Police announced the arrest of the suspect, a 23-year-old Portuguese national. Until now, he had no criminal record.
Besides the deceased victim, aged 35, a friend of the tourist, aged 33, was also injured in the same attack, suffering “deep cuts on the face.” The pair were in Portugal “temporarily,” visiting the country for a bachelor party.
Upon announcing the arrest, the Judiciary Police elaborated that the crime occurred “in the context of an altercation that arose for apparently trivial reasons between the aggressor and the two victims.”
The conflict began when the surviving man was intercepted by three men who accosted him for wearing a cowboy hat. The situation started “verbally and then with physical aggression,” leading the suspect to “use a bladed weapon kept in his car” to seriously harm both victims. According to SIC Notícias, the man who eventually died had gone to help his friend.
When officers arrived at the scene, they found two men “covered in blood,” one of whom was “lying on the ground in a supine position, lifeless and showing no clear signs of life.” Death was declared at the scene.
The friend, taken to the Hospital de Santa Maria, was “conscious, sitting on the sidewalk, also showing visible injuries” on his face and arm.
The PJ explains that the other two men are not considered suspects.
