Story By: Jonathan Macias, Sub Editor: Joseph Golder, Agency: Newsflash

This 16-year-old boy has died after having his head split open when a landowner ran him over with a pickup truck for poaching on his land.

The alleged murder took place this Sunday in a property in the town of Canuelas in the Buenos Aires Province in north-eastern Argentina.

According to local media, Alex Campos, 16, went hunting with two friends named Jose Cabanas and Agustin Cabanas, whose ages have not been reported but who are brothers, when he was supposedly run over on private property by a man driving a Dodge Ram pickup truck.

The teenager’s friends reportedly testified in front of a local court this week and told Campos was allegedly run over by the owner of the property named Rodolfo Sanchez, 57, who supposedly refused to help the victim and later told the police they were robbing a lamb.

Reports said Agustin Cabanas said during his declaration: “He never spoke to us, he ran us over straight away. He crashed into Alex with the front wheel and then with the back one. He cracked his head open.”

He added: “He did not call the hospital. He left Alex laying there like a dog and he told us to pick him up and go.”

Sanchez was arrested by the police and accused of homicide with malice.

The alleged murderer also testified in front of a local court this Tuesday and said he saw two people robbing a lamb, and that he ran the victim over because he was unable to see him when he was driving fast to catch them.

The family who reportedly went to the place after the accident happened also told their version in front of the court.

Campo’s aunt, named Noelia Campo, reportedly said: “We asked him to take him to the hospital but he only asked us to take the body away and when he called the police he justified himself saying they had attempted to rob him.”

Reports said that an initial investigation established the teenager died on the spot due to multiple traumas to his head.

The pickup truck will be examined in the following days and it will be decisive to establish at what speed Sanchez was driving when the incident happened.

The investigation continues while several relatives and friends of Alex Campos have organised protests in the streets of the city to demand justice.

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