Riots initially broke out early Sunday after a Romani Spaniard allegedly stabbed a 28-year-old Senegalese man to death in a low-income neighbourhood. Officials linked the killing to a dispute between drug traffickers, but residents said the victim was trying to mediate in a dispute. Immigrants then set two buildings on fire, including the one housing the suspected killer, who had fled. They erected barricades, burned several cars and garbage containers, and hurled stones and bottles at police and firefighters, who managed to end the rioting only after receiving reinforcements.
The violence started again overnight after a local man fell on the street. Migrants stoned the ambulance that came to attend to him, setting up burning barricades and attacking shops. Several people, including a police officer, were stoned and slightly injured, reports said. Some passers-by were also hit by rubber bullets fired by police. The detainees were from Guinea-Bissau, Senegal, Nigeria and Sudan. Roquetas de Mar has a large population of immigrants employed at vegetable hothouses. The riots were not caused by xenophobia, but the "complicated situation" in the neighbourhood where both migrants and Spaniards lived in poverty, according to representatives of the organization Andalucia Acoge, which works to help immigrants. In February 2000, about 80 people were injured in riots between Spaniards and immigrants in the nearby town of El Ejido after a Moroccan killed a local woman.