Joshua Parfitt
POLICE have revealed they found ‘trails of blood everywhere’ after they broke down the door of a house in Estepona before finding a woman dead in the bedroom.
Arriving at the scene at 11:45pm police found Gloria Tornay Naranjo, 58, in the couple’s bed next her husband Geoffrey Elton, 55, who was bleeding heavily from slit wrists.
Police said there was ‘so much blood’ it was hard to figure out where the attack began, and assumed the trails were from multiple attempts to escape.
An autopsy carried out at the Instituto de Medicina Legal in Malaga confirmed today Tornay died of 10 stab wounds to her back and chest, as well as multiple cuts to her hands and arms as she defended herself from her husband of 30 years.
A neighbour reportedly called police at 11:30 after hearing shouting next door, but police arrived to an eery silence save for the couple’s 15-year-old son who was desperately trying to get inside.
A reconstruction by the Brigada de Policia Judicial presumed an argument had begun in front the son, who was then locked out of the house as the brutal tragedy unfolded.
A neighbour told the Olive Press the couple, who have another son, aged 28, went round for a beer that same evening.
“He held my granddaughter in his arms, but after a beer went back to put a lamb’s leg in the oven,” the neighbour, who did not wish to be named, said.
“Gloria was my best friend. I could confide in her about everything. She was honest, kind, hard-working.
“When my daughter told me today I just wailed ‘this can’t be true’, ‘this can’t be true’.”
She told the Olive Press the couple had lived in the house for around 20 years, and had briefly split up for no more than ‘a month’ a few years ago.
The Hospital Costa del Sol, where Elton was immediately taken after his discovery by police, confirmed yesterday his condition had stabilised and was transferred to a jail in Estepona awaiting proceedings.
The Ayuntamiento de Estepona announced three days of mourning following Tornay’s murder, and a minute’s silence was held by the Asociacion de Mujeres Peñas Blancas Estepona outside the old Casa Consistorial at 6pm on Sunday.
The association’s president Josefina Aragon, 69, told the Olive Press yesterday’s tragedy was the 13th murder of a woman at the hands of a man this year.
“Men capable of horrific violence can often show the complete opposite image outside the house — but no one can tell what happens indoors,” she said.
“There is something seriously wrong with the education men are receiving.”
Five minutes of silence were also observed in Tornay’s hometown of Montejaque at 1:30 on Sunday.
Last year 47 women were murdered at the hands of their partners. The 13 women killed this year is almost double the 7 women killed between January and March in 2018.
Of the 47 women killed last year, 18 were murdered at the hands of foreign partners.
Last week’s murder is the second fatal case of gender violence in the Costa del Sol this year – in January a 47-year-old Spanish woman was killed Fuengirola by her German ex-husband, 50.
