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Former Torres contract worker killed by Barcelona terrorist

One of the victims of the Barcelona terrorist attacks last week has been identified as a former temporary worker at Bodegas Torres, while his murderer, Younes Abouyaaqoub, was subsequently killed in a vineyard near Barcelona.

Spanish police have identified Pau Perez Villan, whose body was found in his hijacked car last Thursday, as the 15th victim in the series of terror attacks that hit Spain last week.

According to syndicated reports in the English media, Villan, an electrical engineering graduate, was a “cellar technician” for Bodegas Torres; the implication being that he was still.

Elsewhere in the Spanish media, however, it was suggested he worked for Torres from 2013 to 2014 but more recently had been working for car company Seat. Torres has confirmed to the drinks business that Villan did indeed work at the domaine for two harvests in 2013 and 2014, having been contracted through an agency, but he had not worked for the company since that time.

Bodegas Torres’ headquarters are located in Villan’s hometown of Vilafranca del Penedès. Three days of mourning for Villan were declared in the town after his death was announced.

It is thought Villan was attacked and killed last Thursday a few hours after a van mowed down pedestrians on Barcelona’s popular ‘Las Ramblas’, killing 13 people. A woman was then killed at a separate attack in the town of Cambrils that same day. The attackers there were shot dead by police

In Barcelona, the driver, Abouyaaqoub, fled the scene and hijacked Villan’s car at some point soon afterwards. Running a police checkpoint that evening he dumped the car in the suburb of Saint Just Desvern and escaped on foot. Police found the car with Villan’s body inside. He had been killed with a single stab wound to the chest.

Abouyaaqoub was himself killed by police on Monday (21 August) in Subirats, 25 miles west of the Catalonian capital.

Spotted by an employee of a petrol station, Abouyaaqoub attempted to hide in a vineyard but was tracked down by police. Running onto the road he was shot when it appeared he intended to detonate a suicide vest.

The vest later proved to be a fake.

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