Court suspends jail sentence for Spain thief killer

MADRID: A nightclub worker who was handed two years jail for killing a thief in a case that made waves in Spain has had his prison sentence suspended, a court said Monday. Far-right party Vox had come to the defence of the man, calling him a “hero” for “having helped a woman” whose purse was stolen by the thief in February 2015 in the southern town of Fuengirola near Malaga. But rightwing newspaper El Mundo reported that the man, identified as Borja W.V., “took justice into his own hands” and urged respect for the law. On Monday, the court in Malaga that initially handed out the jail sentence said it had decided to suspend it for four years, during which Borja cannot commit another offence. In February 2015, Borja, then aged 22, chased and punched a man in the head who had just stolen the woman´s purse. The man died two days later from a brain hemorrhage. The Malaga court in December 2018 sentenced Borja to two years in jail and ordered that he pay 180,000 euros ($200,000) in compensation to the victim´s two daughters. An appeals court upheld the ruling in April