A 32-year-old Honduran trans woman, a resident of Figueres for six years, was stabbed to death on May 19, allegedly by her ex-partner, Andrés R.C., 48, after a series of assaults and judicial decisions that were concentrated in less than 48 hours.
The sequence led to an immediate contradiction. On May 18, the aggressor had accepted a six-month prison sentence for abuse and a restraining order of 250 meters with a prohibition of contact with the victim for one year and four months, but he did not go to prison and remained free before the crime.
The court let him go hours after a new assault
It all began on May 17, when the victim called emergency services after being beaten and threatened with a knife. A doctor then prepared a medical report of injuries and sent it to the court.
The following day, a fast-track trial was held in which Andrés R.C. accepted the sentence for abuse. Hours after that sentence, he violated the restraining order, assaulted the woman again, tried to strangle her, and attempted to hit her with a fire extinguisher.
Officers arrested him, and he spent the night in the holding cell. However, on the morning of May 19, the duty court released him because the victim did not appear to ratify the complaint, despite the previous assaults and his twelve prior records for gender-based violence, robberies, and other crimes.
After his release, he allegedly murdered his ex-partner. Witnesses recorded him washing his hands and arms stained with blood in a fountain before several people restrained him.
The case has led to a review of decisions made in the preceding hours and also of how risk is assessed in repeat offenders. The lack of imprisonment and the dependence on the victim's subsequent statement both weigh in this discussion.
Legal experts question the risk assessment and the 250-meter order
Paula Narbona, a lawyer, maintains that the aggressor's prior records and the accumulated violence in the hours before the crime should have influenced the case's evaluation. In her analysis, these elements should have placed the victim at a high-risk level.
"The restraining order was ridiculous, only 250 meters, a distance within which the police have no time to react" - Paula Narbona, lawyer
Narbona adds that, if no patrol detects the aggressor within the exclusion zone, they can reach the victim because there is no immediate material protection. She also recalls that provisional detention is usually ordered when an accused person violates the same order three times and that previous infractions are usually judged months later.
María José Varela, a lawyer, points to another critical issue in the need to ratify the complaint. The renunciation of testimony due to fear, in her opinion, keeps a central part of the process focused on women who arrive at the judicial headquarters terrified.
The Generalitat and the City Council admit failures after the crime
Jordi Masquef, mayor of Figueres, and Eva Menor, Minister of Equality and Feminisms, agreed that "something has failed." Menor announced the convening of the feminicide analysis group to study possible errors and proposed toughening measures in high-risk cases with the use of preventive detention.
The aggressor had served a sentence in the Puig de les Basses Penitentiary Center, also in Figueres. The Ministry of the Interior has also activated a protocol to alert women who report about the antecedents of their aggressors, while the Ministry of Equality proposes to veto alternative sentences to prison in these types of convictions.
Mar Cambrollé, president of the Trans Platform, frames the murder within a double violence. The added vulnerability of trans women, she pointed out, is added to the violence that other women already suffer.
The figures on recidivism and previous complaints accompany the debate opened after the Figueres crime. Four out of ten sexist aggressors reoffend, double that of other crimes, and this year 22 sexist murders have already been registered, 10 more than in the same period in 2024, with 40.9% of victims having reported, compared to a historical average of 26%.