Murdered teen burglar may have broken into house as part of elaborate prank

He was a very diligent student with an A average. He came from a good family and wanted to be a doctor, like his mother and sisters. Last Sunday, this 17-year-old from Ferrol was stabbed to death after breaking into and entering a house in the dead of night and being caught by the owners, who fought him off with a knife.

Some sources have suggested it may have been part of a risky game played by teenagers in the area, which consists of breaking into homes, placing a personal object inside and recording the scene with their cellphone to prove their "feat." Residents of Pontedeume, the Galician coastal town where the tragedy took place, say there has been a recent wave of break-ins of this nature.

"If someone broke into my house, I'd do the same thing," said a local bar owner

Nobody can offer any other explanation for a seemingly unexplainable event. "If someone broke into my house, I'd do the same thing," says the owner of a local bar. The victim's friends cannot explain it, either. "He was a regular kid, pretty quiet," says a friend of his older sisters. As well as being an A student, he was also a good athlete, and lived in a world where money was not a concern.

Investigators believe burglary is the likeliest motive. Sources familiar with the case said the young man was wearing latex gloves so as not to leave fingerprints, and had another pair in his pocket, along with several sets of keys, among them the keys to the home he had just entered.

Police arrested Agustín F. C., 65, the owner of the house. It was he who called his son-in-law, a Civil Guard officer, to tell him what had happened.

The house is located on a quiet street, and is a former carpenter's shop that the couple refurbished, turning the second floor into the home where they have been living for years. Between 2am and 3am, the wife, who had just gone to bed, heard a noise, turned on the lights and saw a shadow crossing the room, she told police. Her screams woke up her husband, who found the burglar and started fighting with him. The husband said that the young man, who was much taller and more athletic than himself, grabbed him by the throat. The woman ran into the kitchen to get a knife, which she handed over to her husband. He said he waved it around in front of him in the near-darkness, trying to keep the intruder at bay, and made contact at least once.

The burglar left uttering a threatening sentence: "I'm going to give you something to remember me by."

Despite the wound, the young man left through the same window he had come in, and walked a few meters before collapsing on the ground, leaving a trail of blood behind him.