Thomasina Tobin, 51, and her husband Patrick were found dead in the hot tub of their holiday villa in Cullera, Spain, in the early hours of August 25, and a family friend says a Spanish coroner has told relatives that electrocution was the most likely cause of both deaths.
The friend said Patrick appears to have died trying to pull his wife from the water after she got into difficulty, with his wet body then conducting the fatal current himself.
"There was total confusion about how such an awful thing could have happened and to some extent there still is," the friend told the Daily Mail. "The police said it was some sort of accident, but we could not figure out how this could have happened and taken both of their lives."
"I understand now that the coroner's report puts the cause of death down to electrocution and that one of them was found in the tub and one of them was next to it," the friend added. "The assumption is that Paddy was trying to drag Thomasina out. She was really small, but he was still wet and was then electrocuted himself."
Foul play and any third party involvement have already been ruled out. The friend said the family still did not have a clear picture of what happened but that electrocution sounded more plausible than an earlier theory involving a suction fault, adding: "Of course this should never have happened so I am sure there will be further action in the future."
The family's Spanish holiday
Thomasina, originally from Castleblayney in Co Monaghan, Ireland, moved to London, where she met and married Patrick, who was from New Zealand. She worked as a quantity surveyor for luxury hotels at the consultancy firm Turner & Townsend, while Patrick had recently been promoted to manager at the London branch of HCLTech, an Indian company specialising in digital engineering, cloud and AI products.
The couple left London on August 22 with their two children, a 14-year-old boy and a 16-year-old girl, who both have mild special needs, for a two-week break before the start of the school term. They were staying at Villa Luna, a three-storey, cliff-top property spanning 2,691 sq ft with a private pool, an outdoor barbecue area and an indoor spa, which costs £2,600 a week to rent.
On August 24, the family had a barbecue on the terrace followed by a swim in the pool, according to police. The children later went up to their rooms while Thomasina and Patrick used the spa facilities in the basement.
How the bodies were found
Their son went to wake them at around 5am the next day for a planned sunrise trip to the beach but found their bed still made. He searched the house, found his parents in the spa and alerted his older sister. The siblings called a family member before finding a neighbour in the gated community who called emergency services.
Paramedics, local police and Spain's Guardia Civil arrived, but the couple were pronounced dead at the scene. Initial autopsy results reported by local media said both died of cardiopulmonary arrest, and investigators are working on the theory that this was caused by a fatal electric shock. Superficial injuries found on the bodies are said to suggest a struggle or rescue attempt.
The children were taken into the care of the Spanish Red Cross and Cullera City Council, with psychologists offering support, until relatives from the UK and Ireland could be reached. They were reunited with three family members in the early hours of the following Wednesday, and their parents' bodies were removed from the property later that night. The family returned to the UK at the start of this week; it is not known whether Thomasina and Patrick's bodies have been repatriated to Ireland.
Investigation into liability
The Guardia Civil says it is still waiting on toxicology reports sent to a laboratory in Barcelona. The Spanish newspaper Las Provincias has reported that the investigation will now examine possible criminal or civil liability on the part of either the villa's owners or the hot tub's manufacturer.
A judge overseeing the case ordered an expert inspection of the hot tub, and an individual from Andrey Pool Service was seen leaving the property but declined to speak to reporters. Carlos Navarro, chief executive of Goccia Spa, said the hot tub shown in images online was not one his company had supplied, and that even if it was, its two-year warranty would have expired years ago, since the unit his firm sold the owner was installed more than eight years earlier.
Villa Luna sits within the Colina Del Sol complex alongside two other properties behind electric gates. Its owners, brothers Adam and Michal Markuszewski, have declined to comment but have instructed lawyers specialising in civil and criminal law. Their lawyers told the Daily Mail there were no criminal charges or civil lawsuits against their clients, adding: "We maintain and reiterate that the unit was functioning correctly. No customer ever reported any malfunction."
Previous hot tub deaths abroad
Fatal hot tub electrocutions have happened before on holiday. In July last year, Estephania López watched her husband Sagid, 36, die after he was electrocuted in a hot tub at a hotel resort in Ixtapa, Mexico; she said the hotel had failed to maintain the tub. In June 2024, Lizette Zambrano filed a $1 million lawsuit alleging faulty wiring killed her husband Jorge in a hot tub at a Mexican hotel. Zambrano herself was pulled from the water with no pulse and survived after bystanders performed CPR.
Mourning in Ireland and London
Thomasina and Patrick met almost 20 years ago while both working at Nokia in London and went on to raise their children in a four-bedroom house near Greenwich Park. "They were such a super chilled couple and family. I can't believe it," a neighbourhood friend said. "They've lived in London for years. I think it was a very happy marriage. They seemed the perfect couple."
Thomasina is one of nine children of Tommy McArdle, 87, a former director of Irish broadcaster RTE who played in goal for the Monaghan football team in the 1950s and 1960s. She had visited Castleblayney only weeks earlier for her sister's 60th birthday and was said to be in "really good form" ahead of the holiday.
A "Class of 91" reunion for Thomasina's former classmates at Our Lady secondary school, planned for the weekend after the tragedy, was cancelled, with the group instead meeting quietly out of respect for the bereaved families. Former Irish president Mary McAleese offered her sympathies to "all the clan", saying: "what awful grief you all have to bear."
The family friend said relatives rushed to Valencia to support the children after the news broke and have since gathered back in Ireland, with one of Thomasina's sisters travelling to London to care for the two teenagers. "I don't know what will happen with them," the friend said. "Obviously social services are involved and maybe they'll end up moving to Ireland or someone will move to them, it's just too early to say. They were a lovely, really close family."
Funerals for Thomasina and Patrick are due to be held at Our Lady of Knock Church next Friday, with much of Castleblayney expected to attend.
