Agents of the National Police in the Balearic Islands have arrested this Wednesday CA, a businessman of Austrian origin, as the alleged perpetrator of four crimes of reckless homicide and six crimes of serious injuries due to recklessness, after a leisure establishment that he was exploiting, the Medusa Beach Club, collapsed in the Playa de Palma area, leaving four dead and 16 people injured. The events occurred on May 23 at around eight in the afternoon, when the place was full of people who were dining or having drinks inside. At that moment, the floor of the first floor – which housed a glazed terrace – gave way on the ground floor, which could not withstand the impact and gave way in turn on the basement, where the establishment also had tables installed for customers.
The terrace of the Medusa Beach Club did not have an activity or occupation license, and the works to which it had been subjected over the years did not have a permit either. The property had passed a technical building inspection last year with an unfavorable result. The reports prepared by the urban planning and works technicians of the city council and the Palma firefighters concluded that the cause of the collapse was a combination of excess weight due to successive works and overload due to the presence of 21 people that day. These reports were sent to the National Police and the Prosecutor’s Office and the City Council announced that it would appear in the derived case.
The National Police took charge of the investigation a month ago and the Homicide Group has now determined that the collapse of a cover that had been attached to the terrace of the premises occurred. This Wednesday the operation culminated in the arrest of the businessman, who will be brought to justice in the next few hours. The detainee runs other leisure and restaurant establishments in Playa de Palma, although he is not the owner of the premises that collapsed. Two days after the collapse, the businessman explained to EL PAÍS that he has been working in Palma for many years. “I don’t understand how it could have fallen [el inmueble], how could it happen. We are in shock“Very affected,” he said.
The property, located on the coast, had a basement that had a license to operate as a music bar and a ground floor that had a license as a restaurant. However, the first floor – where the terrace was located and which functioned as a restaurant – was totally illegal, since it did not have an activity license or occupation permit. This area, in fact, does not appear in the cadastre and there is no trace of the request for building licenses to be authorized for this purpose.
The works carried out on the building in 2013 were carried out without a licence and, as a result, the owners of the premises were fined 4,500 euros in 2020 for a serious urban planning infringement. According to reports made by the City Council after visiting the premises on three occasions in 2013, the developers carried out partial demolitions of the roof and built a slab and a staircase to access the roof that collapsed on 23 May. The City Council’s caretaker also observed two newly built walls that were not identified in the licence and that had been attached to neighbouring walls. On the last visit to the premises, in November 2013, the municipal technician confirmed the installation of a wooden kiosk on the first floor and the construction of a structure with two 14-metre main beams.
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