A RETIRED German police officer in his eighties has died after shooting himself in the head moments before bailiffs arrived to evict him from his flat in Torremolinos.
The shocking incident unfolded just before midday on Tuesday, October 21, when a team arrived at the man’s first-floor apartment on Calle Murillo Bracho, near the Pablo Ruiz Picasso cultural centre.
The eviction party included representatives of the court, a locksmith, and Policia Local officers, tasked with enforcing a repossession order after the property had been auctioned to pay off an outstanding mortgage debt.
As they prepared to enter, the pensioner, who had lived in the home for nearly forty years, turned the gun on himself and pulled the trigger.
Officers broke in to find him still breathing, but critically injured. Paramedics rushed him to Malaga’s Regional Hospital, where he died soon after arrival.
Neighbours said the man had been struggling for some time with mortgage arrears and had recently lost his wife.
“He’d lived here for decades,” one resident told reporters. “It’s heartbreaking — he didn’t deserve to go like this.”
Police confirmed that the fatal shooting coincided exactly with the scheduled eviction, and that no one else was injured. The man leaves behind three adult children.
The case has reopened debate over Spain’s growing number of forced evictions — and the devastating human toll they continue to exact on vulnerable homeowners.
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