Probe into burial site in Malaga

THE lawyer of Jose Collado, who claims to be the son of nobleman Marquis de Larios, says that police are investigating if the Marquis is buried in Malaga, and not Albacete as previously believed. Collado believes that as heir to the Larios fortune he it entitled to his share in the family’s gin company and vast Dehesa de los Llanos estate.

The remains believed to belong to the fourth Marques de Larios, Jose Antonio Larios Franco, who died in 1954, aged 53, were exhumed last year at a property known as Dehesa de los Llanos, in Albacete. Sixty-two-year-old Jose Collado, believes he is his only son, however, this was not supported by DNA tests.

Collado’s mother, Emilia, told him that in the 40s, when she worked as a cook for the Larios family, she had an illicit relationship with the marquis, who had no other children. She was in love with the marquis, but had to flee to Jaen because of his wife’s jealousy.

She left her son at a Malaga orphanage nine months after his birth on July 31, 1948. She died in 2002, having signed her confession before a notary in Jaen at the request of her son.

Collado says that he doesn’t want money or titles, but just to know for sure who his father is. He says if he did inherit anything he would use it to provide care for orphans and abandoned children. He planned to appeal against the DNA results because he says that they took too long, indicating, in his opinion, that they have been tampered with. He says people often tell him how much he looks like the Marquis.

A trial which was due to begin recently, and at which he intended to defend that the remains exhumed were not those of the Marquis de Larios was suspended. Adamant that he is the marquis’s son, he says that police are carrying out an investigation based on several reports from local people that the remains were moved to a Malaga convent in 1999.

However, the relatives of the Marquis continue to claim he was buried in Albacete.