Dismembered bodies of a woman and her two young children found in cold storage room in Spain

Guardia Civil officers are investigating the discovery of three dismembered bodies in a property in the town of Las Pedroñeras (Cuenca province) in the central-eastern region of Spain. They are a 30-year-old woman of North African origin and her two children, aged five and seven. The woman's partner, aged 44 and also from northwest Africa, has been arrested by police as the alleged perpetrator of the triple crime.

It was a relative and work colleagues of the mother, who alerted the police on Friday afternoon of the disappearance of the woman as she had not gone to work on that day at the town hall in Las Pedroñeras. When Guardia Civil officers went to the family home they found the three dismembered bodies in a cold room in a room adjoining the house.

According to sources close to the investigation, this is a new domestic violence crime. In fact, on Saturday, three new cases of gender violence (including the one in Cuenca) were reported in Spain, leaving four women and two children murdered.

The alleged perpetrator in the Cuenca case had a restraining order against his partner for repeated abuse that the woman had reported. The man, who worked in the slaughterhouse in the town of 7,000 inhabitants, no longer lived with his family and was due to go to prison after being convicted of the crime of mistreatment by a court in Cuenca.

The regional minister of Equality in Castilla-La Mancha, Sara Simón, expressed her «utmost condemnation and pain» for this event and her «affection and support for a family broken by an act of such brutality».