Irishman found dead in Lisbon neighbourhood
Gerard Couzens
Portuguese police are awaiting the results of a post-mortem on an Irishman found dead in a rundown Lisbon neighbourhood on Wednesday morning to determine how their investigation evolves.
The 26-year-old had head wounds, said to have been compatible with an assault, when he was discovered.
Police from Portugal’s PSP police force called in detectives from the Policia Judiciaria (PJ), the country’s national criminal investigation police agency, after concluding his death could be the result of a crime.
But overnight, it was reported locally that the victim could have hurt himself in a fall.
Portuguese tabloid Correio da Manha said there were no clear-cut signs of violence at the scene and cops were also probing the possibility his death could have been “drug-related.”
The man is said to have been in Lisbon for some time and was living at a hostel in the district of Campo de Ourique near the spot where he was found dead.
The area he was found in is Lisbon’s old Casal Ventoso neighbourhood, once described as one of the city’s most dangerous.
In the eighties and nineties, it was known as the biggest drug supermarket in Europe, with thousands of junkies a day flocking to peddle their wares or get a fix.
The shanty town that had sprung up there ended up being demolished, but recent Portuguese media reports say drug problems are still an issue in the area.
Retired footballer Ricardo Quaresma, who played for Barcelona, Inter Milan, Porto, and Chelsea, grew up there.
Before the reports saying his death may not be crime-related, Portuguese media were describing it as a homicide.
The Policia Judiciaria is not expected to make any official comment until the autopsy results are known and it is clearer what the exact cause of death could be.
Hours before, a 35-year-old American tourist was killed and his 33-year-old holiday partner seriously injured in a street stabbing in the upmarket resort of Cascais, half an hour's drive west of Lisbon.
Police announced late on Wednesday night that they had arrested a 23-year-old bar worker who is expected to appear in court this morning.
The murder was initially thought to have been an attempted robbery gone wrong, but it emerged that nothing was stolen from the victims, and the stabbing occurred around 3:20am after a petty row.
The PJ said in a statement released late last night: “The man arrested is strongly suspected of committing one murder and one attempted murder, both with a knife, in the early hours of today on Afonso Sanches Street in Cascais.
“One of the victims died at the scene, and the second was assisted by the INEM emergency services and subsequently transported to Santa Maria Hospital in Lisbon, where he remains hospitalized in serious but stable condition.”
The first police officers on the scene said the row started when the American tourist who survived, was approached by three men who “provocatively” tried to touch the hat he was wearing and was punched in the face when he asked them to stop bothering him.
