The mounted matadors, known in Spain as rejoneadores, are accused of contracting the hitmen to set fire to 12 horses belonging to the Domecq family in June 2001. Six of the animals died instantly, six took years to recover from serious burns.

The arson attack resulted in the Domecq family being unable to take part in 60 mounted bullfights during the 2001, the Independent reported.

However it seems the Domecq horses were not the intended target.

The accused – Jose Miguel Callejon Martin, 30, then a promising young competitor; his father, Jose Antonio Callejon Amoros, and Manuel Buendía – allegedly contracted three Colombian hired assassins, or sicarios, to destroy horses belonging to another rejoneador – Sergio Galan, an up-and-coming rival.

But the Colombians – who have since vanished – attacked the wrong horses by mistake, the paper said. On the day of the crime, Sergio Galan and the Domecq brothers, Luis and Antonio, had taken part in a bullfight in Madrid and when each party set off for home with their horses in trailers, the Colombian hitmen chose the wrong lorry.