The other five involved in the plot to assassinate Francisco Pozo reach plea deals with the prosecution for sentences ranging from two to four and a half years in prison. The hitman who shot him was the same one Pozo believed he was hiring to kill two Colombians.

The execution of a drug dealer in Favara with eight gunshots concludes with a 12-year prison sentence for the hitman, a resident of Aigües.

By Teresa Domínguez – València, 30 July 2025 – 11:20 | Updated 30 July 2025 – 12:56

Francisco Pozo, alias El Pozo, a well-known Valencian drug dealer, had no chance to defend himself—or to react. He got out of his car, behind what was once the largest brothel in Europe, at the entrance to Favara from Cullera, intending—so he thought—to pay a hitman and hand him the weapon to execute two Colombians he believed wanted to kill him. He was wrong—and it cost him his life. He was the real target. That very hitman, a resident of Aigües, had previously been hired by another drug dealer to eliminate him. And he did—firing eight shots. As Pozo stepped out of his Mercedes, engine still running, he was gunned down and finished off with two bullets to the head. It was noon on February 11, 2021. He was 37 years old, had a wife, and a daughter who had just turned six.

This deadly trap, which was to be tried before a jury this Wednesday in a case where the six defendants faced a combined sentence of 110 years in prison, has ended with sentences totaling less than a quarter of that: 26 years and eight months.

Why?
Because of a last-minute agreement between the private prosecution’s lawyer—representing Pozo’s wife and daughter—the public prosecutor, and the six defense attorneys, including criminal lawyers Juan Carlos Navarro and Francisco Miguel Galiana Botella. The agreement hinged on reparation of the harm. In simpler terms, the six convicts had to pay, between Monday and Tuesday, the €240,000 in compensation demanded by both the public and private prosecutors for the victim’s heirs. At the defense’s request, the judge agreed to suspend the prison terms of the two defendants with the lowest sentences: Carles V. N. and Carlos R. A., the latter defended by Francisco Galiana Botella.

In exchange, the defendants had to admit the facts as presented in the new indictment. The crime was still considered murder, but all were acknowledged to have drug dependency as a mitigating factor. Despite initial reluctance from some of the defendants, the agreement was signed shortly before 10:00 a.m. on Wednesday, meaning there was no traditional trial, only a brief hearing in which each accused publicly admitted the facts.

The Sky Messages: The Key Evidence

That’s the present—but let’s go back. One year and two months after Pozo’s murder, in April 2022, the Homicide Division of the Civil Guard arrested the six individuals—now convicted—involved in the criminal conspiracy. It was difficult to unravel the complex plot based on hundreds of messages sent through phones using the encrypted Sky ECC system, commonly used by drug traffickers until French and Dutch police cracked its algorithm, exposing millions of messages from drug lords, terrorists, mobsters, and traffickers across the Western world. These messages clearly described the planning and execution of the plan to eliminate Pozo. The evidence was so irrefutable that the Investigating Judge No. 4 of Sueca validated the police work and ordered all six to be remanded in custody—no bail, no leniency.

This airtight investigation allowed the prosecutor to draft a preliminary indictment in May, requesting a total of 110 years in prison and €240,000 in compensation to Pozo’s wife and daughter—€120,000 each. The deposit of that compensation in court, of which the five main defendants paid 90% in equal parts and the sixth—who only lent them the car used for the murder and escape—paid 10%, was key to the favorable agreement. Spanish law places significant importance on a defendant’s effort to repair the harm done.

To finalize the deal, some facts and implications had to be modified. Ultimately, the hitman, Francisco P. H., accepted the heaviest burden. He admitted to being the sole perpetrator and agreed to an 11-year sentence for murder and one additional year for illegal possession of weapons—thus avoiding the initial request of 20 years for the killing and two more for carrying a pistol without authorization.

His stepson, Carles V. N., the second man seen by witnesses as Pozo was gunned down and executed on the ground like prey in a gruesome hunt, received a four-and-a-half-year sentence—down from the original 20—because the agreement states he accompanied his stepfather to Favara without knowing that Pozo was going to be killed.

José de C. G., accused of planning and instigating the murder, saw his requested sentence of 20 years reduced to three. Likewise, Juan G. C., believed by Civil Guard investigators to be the instigator and business partner of the hitman, received three years and three months in prison, avoiding the original 20-year request.

Carlos R. A., who helped find the hitman, was sentenced to two years—also avoiding the maximum murder penalty. Lastly, Roberto Manuel Ll. V., who lent them the beige Mini used to meet Pozo and flee the scene—although the car wasn’t his, as he had taken it in exchange after a failed cocaine deal in Albacete—avoided the eight-year sentence initially sought by the prosecutor and was sentenced to one year and eleven months.

The Garage Shooting: The Beginning of the End

Behind this entire plot, detailed in the volumes of the case file, was Pozo’s obsession with his safety and his mistaken belief that two Colombians—whom he had paid to collect a debt—wanted to kill him. His suspicion wasn’t entirely wrong, but he was mistaken about who the real threat was. In January, someone—according to the Civil Guard, the same person who would eventually kill him—shot at him as he was entering his garage in Sedaví.