Joshua Parfitt
THE British mother who watched three members of her family drown in a Costa del Sol pool on Christmas Eve has said her daughter, aged 9, attended swimming lessons only ‘a week’ before their Spanish holiday.
Javier Toro, the lawyer representing Olubunmi Diya, presented the claims to Spanish media on Saturday while poolside at the Club la Costa World resort in Fuengirola, where the tragedy occurred just four days previously.
The revelation came as part of a declaration designed to ‘refute’ a series of conclusions made by investigating Guardia Civil agents.
“At no time did the family say in their statements to the Guardia Civil that the [deceased] could not swim. That is completely false,” Toro said.
He added a ‘translation error’ could have caused the misinformation, which led the Policía Judicial de Mijas to put the deaths of Comfort Diya, 9, Praise-Emmanuel Diya, 16, and father Gabriel Diya, 52, down to an ‘accident’ caused by a ‘lack of swimming ability’.
Toro announced the family are considering a ‘parallel investigation’ to determine what happened at 1.30pm on Christmas Eve.
“They came on vacation and the three died in the same pool. It is something very, very rare, and very, very unlikely, and there must be more to it than a simple accident as the Civil Guard has concluded.”
Toro added that a ‘suction issue’ could have dragged the three holidaymakers to the centre of the pool, which he noted was also a ‘concave’ shape.
He said that the father and son were also of ‘tall’ stature, making it more improbable they could have drowned in no more than 2m of water.
“That’s why we don’t rule out doing our own research, because something strange or very abnormal had to happen,” he said.
Toro maintained throughout he did not wish to ‘contradict’ the police report, but merely to find answers.
A statement released on Saturday by hotel Club La Costa World, where the incident took place, said:
“Naturally we have heard the comments made on behalf of Mrs Diya in a widely publicised statement to the media.
“The claims made in that statement are directly at odds with the findings of the police report. This makes it clear that their exhaustive investigations have confirmed the pool was working normally and there was no malfunction of any kind.
“The police report containing full findings has been passed to us and also made public by the police as PDF attached, with the unofficial translation below. We would emphasise that these are findings of the police investigation and not our own internal findings as has been wrongly reported by some media.
“CLC can confirm that the pool remains closed out of respect to the victims of this tragedy and that guests have been, and are being, directed to other pools.
“Our sympathies remain with the family at what we understand must be a stressful and desperately upsetting time for them.”
READ MORE:
- Mother says ‘something was wrong with the pool’ that claimed her son, daughter and husband’s lives on Spain’s Costa del Sol
- Swimming cap of girl found in pumping system of Costa del Sol pool which claimed lives of three British-Americans
- OPINION: Swimming pool expert calls deaths of British family who drowned on Spain’s Costa del Sol ‘an accident waiting to happen’
- British holidaymaker ‘shocked’ after pool where three people died on Spain’s Costa del Sol allegedly left ‘opened and unmanned’…
