{"id":47751,"date":"2025-04-24T22:32:13","date_gmt":"2025-04-24T22:32:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/47751\/"},"modified":"2025-04-24T22:32:13","modified_gmt":"2025-04-24T22:32:13","slug":"john-george-spanish-police-issue-update-in-murder-case-as-they-reveal-main-suspect-left-in-hurry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/47751\/","title":{"rendered":"John George: Spanish police issue update in murder case as they reveal main suspect \u2018left in hurry\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"

Officers announced they have completed their investigation into his murder.<\/p>\n

Civil Guard officers have also appeared to rule out further arrests after revealing the evidence they have points to the two suspects being with the 37-year-old victim around the last time he spoke with his dad.<\/p>\n

Suspected killer Jonny Smyth was extradited to Spain earlier this month<\/a> after being arrested at an Airbnb in Braga in northern Portugal on March 25.<\/p>\n

The first man arrested, a Czech national named locally as Michal Maly, is on bail but still being investigated as an alleged accomplice.<\/p>\n

\"John<\/p>\n

John George and Jonny Smyth<\/p>\n

Detectives had been tight-lipped about their probe, confirming only the two arrests and the discovery of the father-of-two\u2019s body in Rojales near Torrevieja on Spain\u2019s Costa Blanca on January 7.<\/p>\n

Today they released new video of property searches they conducted as part of their investigation and footage from the spot in an orchard where the victim\u2019s body was found as they made their first detailed comments about the case.<\/p>\n

They also said the main suspect left Spain \u201cin a hurry\u201d with his girlfriend, abandoning his pets, \u201cto evade capture\u201d after Billy George reported his son missing.<\/p>\n

A spokesman for the Civil Guard in Alicante said: \u201cThe Civil Guard has completed its investigation into the disappearance of a young Irish man in December last year following the arrest in Braga in Portugal in April and the subsequent extradition of the alleged material author of that man\u2019s homicide.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe victim\u2019s body was found around two weeks after his father reported him missing and thought was in Benidorm visiting friends.<\/p>\n

\u201cInvestigators found the body in Rojales near Torrevieja after an intense search of the area sparked by the fact they suspected the man\u2019s disappearance was involuntary and believed the crime linked to it could have been committed there.<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore the discovery officers had already managed to identify the two suspects. One of them was arrested the same day the body was found.\u201d<\/p>\n

Saying the police investigation began on December 21 when Mr George reported his son missing after flying to Spain to look for him, the force spokesman added: \u201cOfficers began a reconstruction of what could have happened from the moment the victim vanished after reaching Spain on December 6.<\/p>\n

\"John<\/p>\n

John George<\/p>\n

\u201cThey located people who had been in contact with him from that day and spoke to witnesses.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe evidence they gathered pointed to the man found dead being with the two people who became the principal suspects around the time he last contacted his father.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first arrest occurred a couple of hours after the body was found, that of a Czech national aged 32 based in Torrevieja who is suspected of being an accomplice and is currently on bail.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Civil Guard continued after that with its work of locating the other suspect, the man believed to be the killer, who according to information gathered by investigators allegedly fled Spain after the homicide and following the reporting of his disappearance to police.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe left the country in a hurry with his girlfriend, even abandoning his two pet dogs at his home in Orihuela on the Costa Blanca as he sought to evade capture.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Civil Guard requested the issue of a European Arrest Warrant for him and the cooperation of other police forces through Interpol and he was located in Portugal on March 25 and extradited to Spain on April 3.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Jonny<\/p>\n

Jonny Smyth<\/p>\n

Although Spanish police did not formally name Smyth in a lengthy statement officers have described him as someone with \u201cprevious in his country of origin.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was not immediately clear if they were referring to him having a criminal record with convictions, or as being someone known to police because of previous arrests.<\/p>\n

He has been remanded in custody pending an ongoing investigation led by a judge in Torrevieja.<\/p>\n

The Civil Guard said: \u201cThe autopsy has revealed death occurred the night of December 14 from gunshot wounds, the same day the victim spoke with his father for the last time and a week before the dad reported him missing.”<\/p>\n

The video footage the police force released showed police removing tin foil wrapped-packages from an air conditioning vent during a property search.<\/p>\n

It was not immediately clear which of the two suspects\u2019 properties were being searched in the footage.<\/p>\n

The defence lawyer of the man described as an alleged accomplice, the first individual arrested, has attributed the decision to detain his client to his \u201crecent friendship\u201d with Smyth.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Officers announced they have completed their investigation into his murder. Civil Guard officers have also appeared to rule…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":47752,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5011],"tags":[2378,26044,1144,104,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-47751","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-northern-ireland","8":"tag-belfast","9":"tag-john-george","10":"tag-northern-ireland","11":"tag-spain","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114395319129875693","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47751"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47751\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}