A BRITISH pilot who stabbed his Spanish lover to death during a drug-fuelled sex session has been jailed for 20 years.
Aaron Rainbow, 50, was handed the maximum penalty under Spanish law after a nine-strong jury found him guilty of knifing Oscar Tornero, 38, six times in 2023 after a crystal meth binge.
Rainbow, from Surrey, claimed he had acted in self-defence after becoming confused and paranoid at Tornero’s home in sleepy Vallgorguina, 30 minutes north of Barcelona.
But the pilot will spend the next 18 years of his life in Spanish prison – taking into account the two years he has already spent behind bars – after the jury ruled that he had ‘violently and intentionally’ killed Tornero during his chemsex rage.
Rainbow must also cough up over €530,000 to Tornero’s family and ex-partner.
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Speaking in front of court, Rainbow said: “I have the feeling I have not been responsible for this.”
Before the trial, Rainbow’s legal team had lobbied for their client’s acquittal, claiming he had acted in self defence after a ‘fight or flight’ instinct kicked in.
The Brit told court he was afraid that his lover, a fashion store worker who also hired himself as an escort, was filming their steamy drug-fuelled sex session.
He also believed strangers were waiting outside the house in northern Spain to rape him before he headed to the kitchen to look for a knife.
“My instinct told me I was in serious trouble,” Rainbow told the jury.
A neighbour who alerted emergency services as the victim fled reported hearing Rainbow shouting: “I’ll f***ing kill you.”
In reaching a majority verdict, jurors took into account the testimony of another man who had sex with Rainbow in the UK just three days before the fatal attack on Spanish soil.
He told the pilot that he had turned violent on drugs, adding: “I thought you would grab a knife to kill me.”
In a pre-trial summary of the attack, officials said: “A person accused of premeditated murder is on trial. The events took place in 2023.
“According to the prosecutor, the accused and the victim had arranged to meet for sex and to consume narcotic substances for sexual purposes.
“Once at the accused’s home and after consuming narcotics, the defendant took a knife and stabbed the victim several times.
“In order to escape, the victim jumped from a height onto the street and fled on foot until he finally collapsed and died.”
But the killer’s family have accused Spanish cops of botching the investigation, alleging that they failed to examine electronic devices that they said would have substantiated fears Rainbow was being ‘watched by others and set up’.
The pilot’s brother, Dan, said: “After his arrest, Aaron said that he had been drugged, and he was aware of people watching online via cameras and he feared for his life.
“He wanted to get out of there because he had an uneasy feeling. He grabbed the knife in self-defence and that’s when he fatally stabbed the guy he was in the house with.
“It really is like something out of a Netflix show, but this is real life here.”
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