BANGKOK (AP) — A Thai court on Thursday found Daniel Sancho Bronchallo, a member of a famous Spanish acting family, guilty of premeditated murder and sentenced him to life in prison in a brutal case in which he dismembered the victim’s body.
The Koh Samui Provincial Court initially sentenced Sancho to death but commuted the sentence to life imprisonment for his cooperation during the trial, said Police Colonel Paisan Santhep, deputy commander of Surat Thani provincial police, who attended the trial.
Sancho, a 30-year-old chef with a YouTube channel, had been charged with murdering Edwin Arrieta Arteaga, a 44-year-old orthopedic surgeon from Colombia who was vacationing on the Puerto Rican island in the Thai resort town of Puerto Rico. Koh Phangan Last August.
The island is famous for its monthly “Full Moon” beach parties, which attract travelers from all over the world to party all night long.
The convicted man is the son of well-known Spanish actor Rodolfo Sancho Aguirre and fellow actor Silvia Bronchallo, both 49 years old, who were in court on Thursday.
The court also ordered Sancho to pay more than 4.2 million baht ($125,000) in compensation to the victim’s family. Lawyers representing the victim’s family in court had sought 30 million baht ($882,000), according to Spain’s EFE news agency.
EFE also reported that Sancho’s father, Rodolfo, told media after the verdict that he would “always keep fighting, keep fighting.”
At the trial in Koh Samui, Daniel Sancho claimed he got into a fight with Arrieta, who he said tried to sexually assault him. He said that during the struggle, Arrieta fell, hit her head on the bathtub, lost consciousness and later died.
He pleaded not guilty to a charge of premeditated murder.
Sancho admitted to dismembering the victims’ bodies and disposing of the parts on land and at sea. He was given a four-month sentence for concealing or damaging a body but his sentence was reduced to two months because he admitted to what he did, Paisan said.
He also pleaded not guilty to a charge of destroying another person’s documents (the victim’s passport) and received a two-year prison sentence.
Elements of the case – a violent death on a holiday island, celebrity connections and shocking details – were widely covered in the Spanish media, and HBO produced a Spanish-language documentary about the case.
The incident came to light when a garbage collector found what appeared to be a severed pelvis and intestines, weighing around five kilograms, inside a bag of fertiliser at a rubbish dump, according to the Bangkok Post.
Soon after, Sancho reported Arrieta missing to the police, who gathered evidence linking the two men. detain and interrogate him.
Police told reporters that Sancho confessed to the murder and said he planned it because Arrieta had threatened to expose his sexual relations with his family and tarnish their reputations.
Sancho, through his father and lawyer, said that was a distorted version of what he told police and that he denied having a sexual relationship with Arrieta.
Police obtained surveillance footage that allegedly showed Sancho buying a knife, rubber gloves, garbage bags and detergent at a convenience store before Arrieta’s death, which prosecutors argued strengthened their case for premeditated murder.
In his opening statement, Sancho told the court he regretted his actions, according to Spanish daily El Pais.
“I’m sorry that a life was lost and that the parents lost their son,” Sancho said. “I’m sorry that the family wasn’t able to give him a proper burial. I’m also sorry for what I did after his death.”
According to a treaty between Thailand and Spain, after serving a few years in Thailand, Sancho can apply to be deported to his home country to serve the remainder of his sentence, under certain conditions.
Several Spanish nationals are being held in Thai prisons, including another man convicted of premeditated murder and mutilating the victim’s body.
Arthur Segara Prinsep was convicted of murdering his Spanish compatriot David Bernat in 2016. Police suspected Segara had robbed the victim from an acquaintance. The body was stored in a freezer in Segara’s Bangkok apartment and some parts were thrown into Thailand’s Chao Phraya River.
His Death sentence in 2017 His sentence was commuted to life imprisonment by Thailand’s King Vajiralongkorn in 2020.
