El Crimen de Laia 🇪🇦 (Documental)

Laia was murdered as she left her grandparents' house: life imprisonment confirmed for the "monster" who killed her. The little girl was 13 years old; a neighbor kidnapped her as she was going down the stairs of the building's entrance. "Sometimes a tomb holds two hearts in the same coffin," her mother laments. A photo of Laia next to the many graffiti messages painted in her honor on the streets of Vilanova i la Geltrú. "May you feel every hour the terror that my Laia felt with you and the pain of my son, her brother. No one will ever love you; I wish you eternal loneliness." Her name is Sonia; she is Laia's mother, and Guillem's mother. The boy struggles to cope, grows up, walks, as best he can, marked by pain. Laia does not. She was murdered in June 2018 as she was going down the stairs of the building's entrance after spending the afternoon with her grandparents. The neighbor from the apartment below opened the door as the girl was passing, grabbed her by force, and kidnapped her. Her father was waiting for her outside in the car, just a few meters from the building entrance, ready to take her home. She was 13 years old. She never arrived. Juan Francisco López Ortiz, her murderer, is serving his sentence. The Supreme Court has just confirmed that he will not be released from prison for at least the next 25 years, and perhaps never. "The monster who destroyed my daughter's life," Sonia tells CASO ABIERTO, Prensa Ibérica's crime and investigative news website, with more pain than anger. "No sentence can compensate for this... They're not going to bring Laia back to me. She won't come back to life. Laia died the same, suffered the same, lost her life the same..." Her voice trembles, "too much pain." Three court rulings describe the murder as atrocious. The little girl was found dead in her home, as he was trying to put her body in a suitcase. Upon his arrest, he denied the crime; later he confessed, but said he thought the girl was a burglar who had broken into his house. He was found guilty. He appealed. The final, binding sentence from the High Court confirms his life imprisonment with the possibility of review for the cruel, merciless, and perverse murder of the minor. Beforehand, he raped her. June 4, 2018. Laia, like many other days, spends the afternoon with her grandparents in a well-known neighborhood of Vilanova i la Geltrú (Barcelona). "Mom, tell the girl to come downstairs, I'm almost there." It's the little girl's father who, as always, is going to pick her up. He usually leaves the car right in front of the building. That day, roadwork forces him to park a few meters further on. Alerted, Laia says goodbye to her grandparents. More tomorrow. She kisses them and, after crossing the threshold, goes down the first step. Her grandparents live on the second floor; it's two floors to the entrance hall. Laia's grandmother runs, as always, to the window to see her leave through the doorway. Just a couple of minutes pass before her son—Laia's father—calls again. "She's already come downstairs." Her grandmother returns to the door, "Laia!" "Laia!" There's no answer from the little girl; Laia isn't there. A neighbor from the first floor, who happens to be coming up the stairs at that moment, tells them he hasn't seen the girl. Doubts begin to surface; perhaps she went outside and they didn't see her. Her grandmother, from the very beginning, insists that she was at the window and didn't see her leave. Door by door. The search began immediately. Although no one saw her leave, just in case it was a mistake, they searched the surrounding streets. No trace. The local police joined the search, as did some family members. She's nowhere to be found; Laia is missing. While her parents filed a missing person report with the Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police), two of the little girl's uncles, accompanied by the local officers, focused their attention on the building's entrance. They knocked on every door. It wasn't difficult. There were two apartments per floor. The girl wasn't on the second floor, as one of the apartments belonged to her grandparents, and her grandmother had seen her go downstairs. They focused on the first floor. One apartment belonged to a neighbor who entered at the same time and confirmed he hadn't seen her; the other door was slow to open. In that apartment was Juan Francisco López. He didn't live there; he was the owners' son. He had returned from a trip to China and ended up there. He was alone in the apartment—though few knew it—because his father was with his mother in her final hours at a hospital. Smell of bleach. The floor was wet, the mop bucket contained red-tinted water, and a strong smell of bleach hit everyone as soon as they opened the door. It was elusive; it didn't make it easy, but they managed to get inside: Laia appeared; she was there. The search only lasted two hours, but nothing could be done for the little girl. She was in a room, sitting on the floor wi...