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Ex-UK rugby star gets 17 years for Spain murder

A Spanish court has sentenced a former UK rugby player to 17 years in prison for murdering his tenant in a row over unpaid rent.

Ex-UK rugby star gets 17 years for Spain murder
Phil Jones flew to Spain's Costa Blanca to confront Torresgrosa over a year's unpaid rent, the court heard during the trial. File Photo: Phillip Capper

The court in Elche earlier in January found 53-year-old Phil Jones guilty of murdering Spanish forestry worker Domingo Torresgrosa in May 2009, the UK's Daily Mail reported on Tuesday.

Jones flew to Spain's Costa Blanca to confront Torresgrosa over a year's unpaid rent, the court heard during the trial.

The former Hereford Rugby Club player then let himself into the apartment he rented to the Spaniard in Algorfa, near Torrevieja. He killed Torresgrosa by stabbing him twice.

Torresgrosa's body was found two weeks later. Jones had used boot lace to tie his hands and feet behind his back, the Daily Mail reported.

The ex-rugby star who played for Hereford in the 1990s was arrested in the UK in 2010 and sentenced to 15 years in prison. He was also ordered to pay Torresgrosa's family £340,000 (€410,000).

He was extradited to Spain in 2010.

Jones denied murdering Torresgrosa but said he had entered the flat in May 2009 and cleaned it with bleach.

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