A British construction boss managed to celebrate his dream Majorcan wedding despite spending two nights of his stag do in jail after drinks at a luxury beach club descended into an alcohol-fuelled punch-up that injured several waiters and a pair of Spanish cops.
Groom Connor Lorimer, 29, who runs two building firms in St Albans, Hertfordshire, was forced to pay £850 to leave custody on bail so he could tie the knot with childhood sweetheart Lauren, 29, at a converted farmhouse in the sun-kissed Majorcan countryside.
His nuptials at the rustic Es Riquers Hotel were a world away from Palma’s imposing Jutjat de Guàrdia court, where he and seven friends – including best man Joe Lafbery, 29 – were hauled in handcuffs just 48 hours before the ceremony was due to begin.
Their release was processed the following morning after each paid €1,000 to walk free – while their friends embarked on a seven-hour poolside bender at the £300-a-night INNside Melia Palma Bosque.
The unexpected bill didn’t stop the happy couple going all-out on the festivities, which featured a £350-a-night jazz saxophonist and saw each guest handed a personalised cocktail bottle engraved with their names and those of legendary players from Connor’s beloved West Ham United.
Connor Lorimer (right) is pictured with Jack Woods (left) and another groomsmen at his wedding in Palma, Spain
Guests are pictured celebrating Connor and Lauren’s nuptials at the rustic Es Riquers Hotel, a world away from Palma’s imposing Jutjat de Guàrdia court, where the brawl took place
Shocking footage of the fracas, which took place at around 7.30pm, showed security guards and restaurant staff grappling with the allegedly drunken holidaymakers as reggaeton music pumps in the background
Josh Woods pictured with bride Lauren, 29, who got married at a converted farmhouse in the sun-kissed Majorcan countryside. But there was trouble before the wedding when her groom, 29, was forced to pay £850 to leave custody on bail so he could tie the knot
Despite the partner of one of the eight arrested men admitting to that she was ‘mortified’ by the fracas, Lauren joined DJ Angel Rod in an ironic duet of ‘Don’t blame it on the boogie’ as guests cheered her on.
Also attending the nuptials was reality TV Star Jack Woods, 28, a semi-pro footballer and former builder who recently appeared on Channel 4 show Rise and Fall.
Their happiness may prove to be short-lived, as the group face the daunting prospect of returning to Majorca for a criminal trial if prosecutors decide to charge them over the fracas.
A spokeswoman for the Palma courthouse told : ‘The court granted bail for eight (British) men who were detained under a bond for possible civil damage caused. No date was set for them to return. This is a criminal case.’
The Majorcan knees-up follows Connor and Lauren’s legal wedding in in April, in which the Asos worker bride wore a contemporary ivory tuxedo and the groom a brown tweed suit and champagne coloured tie.
The newlyweds – who have been together since 2011 and live in a £460,000 house in St Albans – happily posed for pictures outside the registry office with their young son, and were later pictured cutting their heart-shaped wedding cake.
Sharing photos of the event on Facebook, Lauren wrote: ‘Legal but not official, to be continued June 2024’.
But the getaway – dubbed ‘Wedding Part 2’ by guests – descended into chaos on Tuesday last week when Connor and Joe were arrested when police accused them, Joe’s 22-year-old brother Finlay, pals Samuel Yeomans, 29, John Squires, 29, George Cook, 30, and Callum Dudrenec, 28, of instigating a fight at the upmarket Balneario Illetas beach club in Cavalia.
The newlyweds – who have been together since 2011 and live in a £460,000 house in St Albans – were legally married in April. The celebration in Spain – dubbed ‘Wedding Part 2’ by guests – took place over the weekend. The couple are pictured alongside their wedding party
Despite the partner of one of the eight arrested men admitting to that she was ‘mortified’ by the fracas, Lauren joined DJ Angel Rod in an ironic duet of ‘Don’t blame it on the boogie’ as guests cheered her on. Lauren is pictured at her wedding
Shocking footage of the fracas, which took place at around 7.30pm, showed security guards and restaurant staff grappling with the allegedly drunken holidaymakers as reggaeton music pumps in the background.
One woman in a bikini – as well as one of the security guards – ended up being knocked to the ground in the scuffle.
Speaking exclusively to , a waiter injured in the clashes accused the men of turning ‘aggressive’ when staff begged them to stop throwing rubbish into the sea.
Married father-of-one Nacho, 42, who did not wish to give his surname, had ‘never seen a situation like that’ in 25 years of working in restaurants on the Costa del Sol.
He said the brawl was ‘like a battle’ which saw him repeatedly punched and later caught in a headlock by one of the Brits.
He said: ‘From early in the morning they were having drinks on the beach, for celebration. When I came to the restaurant to work it was about 4.00pm, but they were there about 10 in the morning.
‘They stay drinking, but then they start disturbing the other clients and dropping trash and bottles and things like that over the sand and the sea.
‘The fight started with that, the trash, because they were throwing trash into the sea, and our colleagues had gone in for a dip because they finish their work, and they tell them to stop.
Lauren is seen smiling and apparently drinking with a guest as she celebrates her wedding
Also attending the nuptials was reality TV Star Jack Woods, 28, a semi-pro footballer and former builder who recently appeared on Channel 4 show Rise and Fall
‘Then they [the British men] start to laugh about him and insult him and some things like that.
‘Finally they, the group, start to hit him. Then more colleagues go to the beach to try to stop and then they [the British group] start to hit everybody.’
Nacho said tensions arose prior to this when some of the Brits and their wider group tried to go into the beach club’s high-end restaurant while in their soaking wet beachwear.
He said: ‘We start to say you cannot do this, just take your shoes and wear a t-shirt please. They don’t obey us, so I think they were angry for that.’
He said he became embroiled in the fracas when he saw his manager and another colleague attacked as they went to the beach to intervene in the clashes.
He added: ‘For a while, 30 seconds maybe, the fight stop a little bit.I was stood in the restaurant at this point…Then I saw them hit my boss and the rest of people so that’s when I decide to go down to the beach to help.
‘I try to stop the fight, in as far as I can, it was quite difficult. There was the big man in the shorts he starts to hit me, you can see in the video. He was hitting in my head, in the back of my neck.’
Nacho was sent back to the restaurant by his boss, but the nightmare simply continued, he said.
In a second video from another angle, one man was seen being punched in the face. He is seen here in this video grab falling backwards to the ground after being hit
A woman, who was knocked over during the brawl, is helped up by a member of staff
Eight people were arrested after the mass brawl on Wednesday, with three people left injured
The Brits are pictured fighting after locals allegedly told them to stop throwing litter in the sea
Eight British men were arrested in Majorca following the brawl outside the restaurant. They were pictured getting handcuffed on some steps at the beach club restaurant before being taken away by police. The fight resulted in a waiter and two police officers being injured
‘When I was in the restaurant the big man start to blame me and he say to me, saying ‘F*** you Spanish people’ and another girl also start to blame me.’
Asked how he felt about British holidaymakers coming to Spain, he blamed ‘English’ tourists’ for the problems, adding: ‘Often here in Magaluf, when it’s a big fight, it’s English involved, not Scottish, not Irish, not Wales.
Another waiter hurt in the fight told how he worries about returning to work in case other tourist brawls happen.
The man, who did not want to be identified for fear of losing his job, claimed the group racked up a €1,500 bill in the restaurant before the chaos erupted.
‘I saw the fight from the restaurant’, he said. ‘I went to the reception and I start to call the authorities, when I saw a colleague of mine, a woman… [go] flying in the sand.’
On intervening, the waiter said a ‘big man’ in the British group hit him, adding: ‘He hurt a lot of people’.
‘When I get down there, another one [Brit] told me, ‘do your f***ing job, you are dead’.
In exclusive footage obtained by , four British men were seen being bundled out of a civil guard van and brought into the courthouse in Palma after they were involved in a violent beach brawl in Majorca on Wednesday
The accused arrived handcuffed in shorts and T-shirts in two police vans Thursday afternoon
The group (pictured Thursday) were filmed in a massive brawl on a beach in Majorca
‘I was like ‘what in the world did I do to you?’ I just arrived, is it because I am staff and I look the same. I don’t understand anything.
‘Then after the man said what he said to me, I turned around…and then someone hits me.’
The waiter told how he was knocked to the ground during the attack and said he is still in pain now.
He added: ‘I can’t think how this can happen. I think it’s important to say, I think this is the same thing we are having here in these past weeks.
‘All this news we are having is because of this sort of tourism. We are the workers, we don’t want this. We want good quality tourism.’
He warned that when tourists ‘come here to drink a lot, it has these types of consequences.’
The waiter said he felt fearful of returning to work, adding: ‘When I see tourists like this, I think ‘What do we have now?’ It could happen now [again].’
But rather than wishing ill on his alleged attackers, the waiter said he felt ‘bad’ for them ‘because of this reputation of the English people’.
A group of British tourists embarked on a seven-hour poolside bender after eight of their pals spent the night in a Majorcan police station following a beachside punch-up that injured two cops and a waiter
The gang, believed to be made up of builders from St Albans, Hertfordshire, spent Friday afternoon laughing and downing beers without a care in the world at the £300-a-night INNside Melia Palma Bosque hotel
The group seemed comfortable and relaxed Friday on afternoon as they soaked up the rays on the Spanish isle
He added: ‘I want this problem to be solved. Now we are seeing a lot of [anti-tourist] demonstrations, there’s going to be more, that’s why I don’t feel good [about this], because maybe this will be the point of no return.’
He told how a relative working at another hotel on the island said he had received messages from British tourists asking if it is ‘safe for them to travel here’.
The brawl in Majorca comes amid a backdrop of ongoing anti-tourist protests on the island, as locals attempt to clamp down on disruptions caused by holidaymakers.
Last Saturday, around 15,000 people took to the streets of Palma to protest against overtourism, with those marching seen holding placards reading ‘tourists go home’.