Spanish boy’s murder fuels debate on prison sentences

The case of the abduction and murder of a small boy, apparently by his father's girlfriend, has stunned Spain and fuelled a fierce political debate about jail sentences for those found guilty of such crimes.

Eight-year-old Gabriel Cruz went missing on February 27th while walking the short distance between his grandmother's house in the southern town of Las Hortichuelas and his cousins' home nearby.

After an 11-day search, on Sunday police found his body in the trunk of the car of Ana Julia Quezada, his father's partner, who is now in custody. According to media reports, she has confessed to picking Gabriel up in the car, where she says she struck him on the head with the blunt edge of an axe before strangling him.

Having suspected Quezada (43) soon after Gabriel’s disappearance, the police followed her movements closely. They reportedly arrested her while she was moving the boy’s body.

Modern-day St Patricks: the child shepherds of Lesotho

---

Donald Trump tells Taoiseach he plans to visit Ireland

---

Civilians flee besieged eastern Ghouta as army advances

---

Orban to rally support as graft claims swirl before Hungary's elections

---

The case has dominated the news headlines, with the leaders of the main political parties offering condolences to the family and many celebrities tweeting their support and outrage. There has also been a non-stop, often lurid, commentary on the case on radio and television, which, along with many social media users have frequently focused on the background and nationality of the only suspect in the case, who is from the Dominican Republic.

‘Messages of hate’

After hundreds of people turned out on the streets of Almería on the day of Gabriel’s funeral, his mother, Patricia Ramírez, who is separated from his father, called for an end to the vitriol circulating against Quezada. “She shouldn’t appear anywhere, nor should anyone retweet messages of hate,” she said, adding that “it can’t all end up with just the face of this woman and words of anger”.

However, the case’s apparent resolution has coincided with a congressional debate about whether or not to maintain a law, introduced in 2015, allowing convicted criminals’ jail terms to be revised, ensuring they are kept behind bars for life.

On Thursday, congress debated two proposals, by the governing Popular Party (PP) and the liberal Ciudadanos, to tighten the law further, in the face of an opposition initiative to withdraw it altogether. Shortly beforehand, 100 academics had presented a petition calling for the withdrawal of reviewable life imprisonment on the grounds that it undermined democratic values.

In a fraught session, the parents of several murdered children followed the debate in the visitors’ gallery. The PP’s José Antonio Bermúdez gestured to them as he made an emotional appeal to the opposition to maintain the law. “Can you imagine these terrible things happening to any of us?” he said. “It hasn’t and here we have people who have lived these tragedies. When you come up here to speak, don’t just answer me, look at the gallery and convince them.”

Reviewable life sentences

But the proposals of the PP and Ciudadanos were rejected, paving the way for parliament to eliminate reviewable life sentences altogether.

Many observers felt that, given the circumstances, the debate should have been postponed until the media frenzy surrounding the Gabriel Cruz case had subsided. Instead it went ahead, as El País newspaper reported, "in an intoxicated atmosphere, tainted by electoral interests and society's demand for justice to be served".

The PP’s approach to the issue has drawn accusations of opportunism and populism, as has that of Ciudadanos, which until recently was calling for the withdrawal of the measure from the penal code. Its U-turn has come as it vies with the PP for dominance of Spain’s political right.

Arguing against the measure, the Socialist Party’s Juan Carlos Campo said that “without reviewable life imprisonment we defeated [terrorist group] Eta, and with it we haven’t prevented the death of Gabriel”.