Moroccan Taxi Driver’s Murder in Spain Sparks Hate Crime Investigation

The investigators tried to find out if the victim had any disputes with anyone. His relatives told them that a few months ago, the taxi driver would have filed a complaint against a person who was threatening him. At this stage of the investigation, the Mossos do not want to rule out any hypothesis. In addition to the crime of theft, they are also exploring the trail of a settling of scores, a racist crime or a premeditated act, or that the perpetrator is a mentally ill person.

The main difficulty is that there are no witnesses, since the murder took place in the early Sunday morning, in a one-way street at the end of the city. For the moment, the scientific police continue to search for fingerprints and evidence in the victim’s taxi or on the knife used to commit the crime, found in a neighboring street.

To read: Moroccan-Origin Taxi Driver Fatally Stabbed in Northeastern Spain

The victim received more than twenty knife wounds to the forehead, back, neck, heart and various parts of the body, as revealed by the autopsy performed on his body. Born in Morocco, this taxi driver who had been living in Lleida for more than 20 years, leaves behind a widow and two children, one five years old and a baby a few months old. The date of the funeral is not yet known.

The Barcelona Elite Taxi association expressed on Tuesday in a press release "its sadness and anger" at the loss of their colleague "killed in such a cowardly and savage way", calling on the authorities to urgently take all necessary measures to guarantee the safety of taxi drivers. "The taxi is the safest means of transport that exists and the installation of cameras would facilitate the work of the police when it comes to clarifying any criminal act," it said.