Three people have been arrested in connection with the death of a photographer who inhaled poisonous toad venom during a shamanic ceremony, the Guardian reported.
The incident resulting in the death of fashion photographer José Luis Abad took place in the Valencian town of Enguera in July 2019, and reportedly involved Spanish porn actor Nacho Vidal.
A statement from the Guardia Civil said that two men and a woman had been arrested in relation to the incident on suspicion of involuntary manslaughter and violating public health laws.
According to the statement, officers began the investigation “after the death of a person during a mystical ritual involving the inhalation of vapors from the venom of the bufo alvarius toad.”
At the conclusion of an 11-month investigation, officers were able to establish that offenses of involuntary manslaughter and public health were at play, allegedly committed by the ritual’s organizers.
The practice is reportedly relatively common, often performed as a form of alternative medicine. However, the statement warned that the ritual is actually more dangerous than is typically assumed, claiming that the “apparently inoffensive ancestral ritual” poses a serious public health threat, especially to “highly suggestible” practitioners “who were especially vulnerable and were seeking alternative ways to cure certain ailments or addictions.”
In a statement, Vidal’s lawyer, Daniel Salvador, denied that the porn star had presided as shaman in the fatal ritual, and claimed that the death was accidental.
“Nacho is very upset by the death of this person, but he considers himself to be innocent,” Salvador told the Spanish news agency Efe. “With all due respect to the dead man and his family, Nacho maintains that the consumption [of the venom] was completely voluntary.”
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