Police detain Spain train crash driver as suspect

A woman places a candle on the outside of the cathedral for the victims of the train accident in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, Friday July 26, 2013. Investigators have taken possession of the “black boxes” of the Spanish train that hurtled at high-speed along a curve and derailed, killing 80 people, a court official said Friday. Analysis will be performed to determine why the train was traveling far above the speed limit when it crashed near a station in Santiago de Compostela, in the northwestern Galicia region, said court spokeswoman Maria Pardo Rios. The train’s operator remained hospitalised Friday and will be questioned by police but she said the interview will not happen Friday. AP

SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELA, Spain — Police say they have detained the driver of a train that crashed in northwestern Spain and killed 78 people.

Galicia region National Police Chief Jaime Iglesias says driver Francisco Jose Garzon Amo was officially detained in the hospital where he is recovering.

Iglesias said Friday that Garzon Amo would be questioned “as a suspect for a crime linked to the cause of the accident.”

He says the driver is being guarded by police and cannot yet testify because of his medical condition. Iglesias said he did not have details of the medical condition but that it could delay the driver’s statement.

Police scientists examining the remains of those killed in Spain’s worst train crash in decades lowered the death count from 80 people to 78 on Friday and said the count could change as they continue their work identifying body parts and associating them with others.

Investigators, meanwhile, have taken possession of the “black boxes” of the train, which hurtled at high-speed along a curve and derailed, court spokeswoman Maria Pardo Rios said Friday. The boxes record train’s trip data, including speed and distances and braking and are similar to flight recorders for airplanes.

The revised death toll came as forensic scientists matched body parts with each other at a makeshift morgue set up in a sports arena in Santiago de Compostela, in the northwestern Galicia region, where the train crashed Wednesday just as it was entering the outskirts of the city, said Antonio de Amo, the police chief in charge of the scientific service for Spain’s National Police.

De Amo said police are still working to identify what they believe are the remains of six people.

Analysis will be performed to determine why the train was traveling far above the speed limit when it crashed near a station in Santiago de Compostela, Rios said. She declined comment on how long the analysis will take.