Young Spanish Christian killed in possible homophobic attack

A group of young people kicked and punched the young man and left him lying in the middle of the street. Even though the health services tried to revive him for two hours, they could not save his life.

According to the Spanish daily El Pais, Samuel Luiz played the transverse flute in the Pentecostal church in the Spanish city of A Coruña since he was 15 years old.

On the night of the attack, Luiz was the “spiritual guide of a good handful of boys", writes the newspaper. All the boys came from the Christian Congregation, an evangelical movement founded in Chicago in 1904, with followers worldwide, which arrived in Spain through a Galician emigrated in São Paulo.

Samuel himself also moved from Brazil to Spain. When he was 14 months old, his parents Maxsoud and Lolita moved to Spain. Maxsoud, a Brazilian, met Samuel's mother in Galicia before moving back to Brazil as a couple. When young Samuel was born, they decided to move back to Spain.

In the northwestern city of A Coruña, Samuel's father became a deacon in the local congregation. Growing up, Samuel "always accompanied him with the Bible under his arm", says a spokesman to El Pais.

Recently, Samuel worked with the Red Cross and worked as a nursing assistant in a gerontological residence in A Coruña. In the afternoon, he studied at home. Luiz was a year away from achieving his next goal: becoming a dental technician.

Close friends of Samuel Luiz told El Pais that the 24-year-old did not hide his sexual orientation. His family "knew" that he was gay. But, as his father declared, this was a pending issue at home, and Luiz never confirmed it to his parents.

That sexual orientation might be the "reason" why Luiz was killed by a mob last Saturday.

Video call

On that faithful night, Samuel went out with his friends into the nightlife of A Coruña. After ten months, the Spanish government loosened Covid restrictions. Therefore, nightclubs were open again.

According to a friend of Samuel who was with him when it happened, she and Samuel were making a video call when some passers-by, a man and woman, noticed them. The couple thought they were being filmed. An altercation erupted.

The Spanish daily El Mundo writes that the attackers shouted homophobic languages, which caused Luiz to react. According to his friends, Samuel did not hide his sexual orientation. It did not take long before the passers-by attacked Samuel. Luiz was beaten and left behind. After a few minutes, the attacker came back, bringing along around a dozen more people, who beat Luiz again.

According to El Pais, the mob beat the 24-year-old for over 150 metres through the streets. The young man tried to escape several times. He fell and got up again three times. After that, Luiz did not stand up again.

An ambulance team tried to revive Luiz at the scene and then took him to the hospital, where he died later.

In Luiz' last moments, Ibrahima Shakur, a Senegalese citizen, did not hesitate to try to help Samuel to stop the violent clash. He has already given a statement at the police station and is prudent in describing the events. He prefers not to go into details not to hinder the police investigation. But he explains why he intervened without thinking twice: "I don't like violence. This could happen to anyone. And if it were me and nobody broke in, I could also die", says Shakur to El Pais.

Like so many other residents of A Coruña, Ibrahima attended the tribute ceremony in the main square on Monday. There, by chance, he met Samuel's friends. They recorded a video and thanked him for his heroic deed.

Confusion

In the aftermath, the police have arrested four young people for the deadly attack. They are all between 20 and 25-years old and live in A Coruña, reports the police on Twitter.

Luiz's father, Maxsoud Luiz, made a statement to La Voz de Galicia. He made no reference to the possible homophobic nature of the attack. The father does talk about the brutality of his son's death and that all he did was try to mediate an argument. He attributes the attack to "confusion" and claims that his son "has done absolutely nothing" to get him killed.

The attack on Samuel Luiz caused thousands of people across Spain to demonstrate against homophobia. People in Barcelona, Madrid, and Valencia, among other places, went to the streets to make their voices be heard. Although the police have not ruled out homophobia, they have not yet confirmed it either. According to the authorities, the case needs to be studied further.