John Culatto
A BATTLE-hardened security guard for Gibraltar’s Chief Minister has chased and pinned down a suspected murderer.
Brave James Abecasis told the Olive Press how he tackled the knife-wielding attacker as he fled the scene of a fatal stabbing on the Costa del Sol.
Father-of-one Abecasis, 28, revealed how he chased the alleged killer, a Brazilian, after stepping in to try and stop the vicious attack, outside a nightclub in Estepona.
While most people would have left the scene, the former soldier said his ‘instinct’ told him to chase the attacker, who was running away.
“I went flying after him and as he rounded the block I tackled him to the floor, getting grazed on my hand as I took away the knife from him,” he continued.
“I then held him down with a club security guard until the police arrived a few minutes later and cuffed him.”
Gibraltar-born Abecasis – who spent four years with the Royal Gibraltar Regiment, much in the Middle East – had been on a night out with friends.
When they came out of the Mykonos nightclub in Estepona, at 4am, a fight quickly broke out between two strangers.
It has since emerged that Sabinillas hairdresser Abdessamad el Ammali, 21, from Morocco, died within minutes of the stabbing. He had accidentally spilled his beer over the attacker, it has since emerged.
“They were on the floor hitting each other and no-one had intervened,” he told the Olive Press.
That is when he decided he had to do something.
“Someone held one of the guys and I held the other, who I had face-to-face,” he revealed.
“It was really violent and there was literally a river of blood as his attacker must have hit an artery,” revealed Abecasis, who has been working in the Chief Minister’s security team for four months.
“I think I will have a few flashbacks because of all the blood there.”
Abecasis revealed that his army training has helped him through life.
“I definitely don’t regret it,” he said. “I am proud of what I did. Even the judge at the initial court case hearing this week told me how brave I was.”
