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What is the function of "ocurrido" in this sentence?

Le pedí que vinieras, señor Warren, para que no malinterprete el incidente ocurrido con el señor Tolly

I asked you to come, Mr. Warren, so that you do not misinterpret the incident with Mr. Tolly.

Because it isn't translated, it's hard to get a feel of how to use it.

If i think of it as a verb it seems to be missing a "que" before ocurrido?

Maybe it's functioning like an adjective and isn't tranalsted because we can't use it as such in English.

It also seems like it would mean exactly the same if left out of the sentence.

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"Ocurrido" there is optional. Its value is adjectival.

(Note: I find a mistake in the Spanish translation -- if the interlocutor is referred to as "Mr. Warren" (señor Warren), he should be formally treated as "usted", not informally as "tú"):

  • Le pedí que viniera, señor Warren, para que no malinterprete el incidente (ocurrido) con el señor Tolly.

The participle phrase is an abridged relative clause:

  • Le pedí que viniera, señor Warren, para que no malinterprete el incidente que ha ocurrido/que ocurrió con el señor Tolly (I asked you to come, Mr. Warren, so that you do not misinterpret the incident which has occurred/which occurred with Mr. Tolly.)

The closest "ocurrido" seems to get to English is the rather awkward phrase "having occurred" (contrary to what I thought, "occurred" alone is even much less usual):

  • I asked you to come, Mr. Warren, so that you do not misinterpret the incident having occurred with Mr. Tolly.

After doing some research, I have found here grammatical evidence that, unlike in English, abridged relative clauses using a past participle can be formed not only with transitive but also with some intransitive verbs in Spanish. In English a passive meaning will always be required for the past participle to be used in an abridged relative clause:

  • The incident (that was) caused with Mr. Tolly was misinterpreted.
  • El incidente (que fue) causado con el Sr. Tolly fue malinterpretado.

However, in Spanish we can come across some abridged relatives using intransitive verbs (these examples are taken from or based on verbs used in the mentioned source):

  • La niña [nacida en el hospital] fue dada de alta al día siguiente. (The girl (who was) born in hospital was discharged the following day) (While "nacer" is intransitive in Spanish, it has a transitive origin in English: be given birth).

This other example is not so clearly one of an intransitive verb, because "ser muerto" can be interpreted as the passive form "be killed":

  • El piloto [muerto en aquella batalla] fue enterrado junto a sus compañeros. (The pilot (who was/got) killed in that battle was buried with his partners)

Of all the examples contained in the source, another that illustrates the difference between English and Spanish is "llegar":

  • Noticias llegadas de Alemania informan que España ha ganado la Eurocopa. (News from Germany report that Spain has won the Eurocup) (As is the case with "incident occurred", I also find examples of "news arrived" in this abridged relative pattern on the Internet, but I doubt how idiomatic they may be)

Others are "venir" and "salir" (in English a different transitive verb will be used). Notice that the gender/number variation accounts for the adjectival value mentioned at the beginning:

  • Personas venidas del exterior informan que ... (People coming from abroad inform that ...)

  • Los productos salidos al mercado son ... (The products launched into the market are ...)

A V-ing form will be used to refer to a current or future situation:

  • The products coming out soon are ...
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  • "which has occured / which occured / that acccured" I agree with as well as the spanish counterparts. However, "... misinterpret the inciident occurred..." doens't make sense in english. It's either you leave it out or rephrase it as you correctly did. This is exactly why "ocurrido" used like the example spanish sentence is confusing to me.
    – Simple
    Commented Jul 14 at 22:21
  • Thank you for your comments, which have led me to elaborating further.
    – Gustavson
    Commented Jul 14 at 23:46
  • @Simple "However, '... misinterpret the inciident occurred...' doens't make sense in english." -- I'm not super into grammar, but intuition tells me this might be related to how adjectives can go after nouns in Spanish, but only before nouns in English. That should be "the occurred incident", a phrase that can be found online.
    – JoL
    Commented Jul 16 at 16:11
  • @Simple As another example (again working from my intuition, I'm not great with grammar terms), in the Spanish "un cajón lleno de juguetes", "lleno" is an adjective. When you translate, you can also use an adjective to keep the words adjacent and say "a full drawer", but that doesn't permit you to add what it's full of. You need something in between in English: "A drawer that is full of toys".
    – JoL
    Commented Jul 16 at 16:44
  • @JoL My point is that "el incidente ocurrido" is close to "the incident having occurred". As for your other example, you can say "a drawer full of toys", can't you?
    – Gustavson
    Commented Jul 16 at 16:48

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