Almost 30 years after the disappearance of the three young girls, the Alcasser crime remains unsolved.
By Joana Melo
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30 December 2021
On 13 November 1992, around 8 p.m., Miríam, Toní and Desirée, aged 14 and 15, left their friend Esther's house for a party at a disco in Picasent, and were never seen again.
The three of them left the house of their friend Esther, who was ill and could not accompany them, and went to the disco Coolor, situated in the neighbouring town. To do so, they decided to take an autostop, which was common at this time in this locality among young people.
As none of them had returned home the next day, the authorities were alerted and the search began. On that same day, other incidents occurred, which may or may not be directly related. In one of them, two civil protection volunteers who were searching were run over by an all-terrain vehicle, one of them died and the other was admitted to hospital with a concussion and fourteen fractures, from which he recovered with sequels.
For a long time the case showed no progress, due to the lack of clues about the whereabouts of the three girls. Nevertheless, the police received several calls from people claiming to have seen the three girls in different parts of Spain. One of these calls was from a woman who claimed to have seen them entering, through her window, a small white car. This car would have four people, would have stopped on the right-hand side of the road and the three would have got into it. This call was one of those that caught the attention of the police, who investigated the case, and took it as valid.
The car that took the girls
The search was extended outside Spain and Interpol was also alerted. The families of the missing girls distributed posters in several languages in some African countries (as a clue led to Morocco, where they could have been taken as sex slaves) and to Europe.
The media covered the whole investigation, not only in Spain but also in England (where Miriam's father went to conduct interviews and appeal for everyone's support).
On January 27, 1993, seventy-five days after her disappearance, two beekeepers found an arm sticking out of the ground, buried in a well in the Roman ravine, a place near Tous. This arm had a watch on the wrist, the one that could be Toni's (she always wore a big watch).
The corpses were found wrapped in a rug inside a large well that had been dug on purpose. (We do not think it is necessary to describe the other details).
In addition to the bodies, several objects were found around them, such as an unexploded cartridge and a video game. However, the most relevant clue was a piece of paper found beside some bushes, with the name of a certain Enrique Anglés Martins. This piece of paper was the key to identifying the first suspects.
The Civil Guard then went to the house of Enrique Anglés, in Catarroja. Enrique was António's brother, a known delinquent from the area who was already on police records. In the house were Enrique Angles, his sister Kelly, her boyfriend and Angles' mother, Neusa Martins. The first three were sent to Patraix barracks and the house was searched. During the search, other brothers of Enrique Angles, Mauricio and Ricardo, arrived, accompanied by a friend, Miguel Ricart, known as "el Rubio". A civil guard recognised the latter as Antonio's partner in several crimes, and he was eventually taken to the barracks as well.
António Anglés
Antonio Anglés, who had been on the run from the beginning, and despite one of the first leads placing him in a hairdressing salon in Valencia, and all the help from the population, he was never found.
In March 1993, a collaborator of the Portuguese anti-drug police claimed to have lived with Antonio Angles for a fortnight in the coastal town of Caparica. According to this collaborator, Angles stole his passport with the intention of taking a boat to Brazil (his country of birth). On 15 March 1993, the crew of the merchant ship Cidade de Plymouth found a Portuguese stowaway on board who, on being discovered, threw (or was thrown) himself into the sea wearing a life jacket. This life jacket was later found in a harbour, leaving no trace of the passenger.
Antonio Anglés is currently on Interpol's website as one of the most wanted people in the world.
António Anglés
Miguel Ricart made a voluntary statement around midnight on 27 January. Because of the contradictions he made, his friendship with Antonio Anglés and the fact that his car matched the witness descriptions, Miguel Ricart was arrested at around 5am. 14 Hours later, before midnight on 28 January, Ricart made his first statement as an accused before the Civil Guard, in which he confessed his participation in the crimes. Ricart, who was remanded in custody. He reconfirmed his participation in two further statements made on 30 January and 2 March.
His various statements were incomplete and contradictory, calling their veracity into question. On 29 March, two months after his arrest, Miguel Ricart made a fourth statement before the judge, José Miguel Bort, in which he presented a radical change in his story, denying his participation in the crimes and alleging that the Guardia Civil had tortured him to force him to incriminate himself.
Later, on 30 September 1994, Miguel Ricart accused two more people of participating in the triple crime. These were Mauricio Anglés, Antonio Anglés' brother, and another man, until then never mentioned, whom Ricart nicknamed Nano.
Immediately after the first autopsies and at the request of the families, Professor Luis Frontela conducted a second, more thorough autopsy on the bodies of the teenage girls. In this autopsy, the Valencian forensic team and two civil guards were present as observers, taking photographs of the procedure.
Frontela carried out a DNA study of the hairs found on the corpses and their clothes. Fifteen hairs were found, twelve of which did not belong to Ricart or Anglés. The remaining three were damaged and could not be analysed. The professor discovered DNA sequences belonging to between five and seven different people but could not determine the exact number of people involved in the crimes.
Professor Luis Frontela
On 1 February 1993, a 51-year-old man presented himself before the Guardia Civil. Miguel Nicolás Cortona, also known as "el de Liria", who had shared a cell with Ricart, stated that he had been with the brothers and that they had made comments about the kidnapping and rape of these girls and about how to hide the evidence.
The trial of the Alcácer triple crime took place in the Second Section of the Provincial Court of Valencia. It began on Monday 12 May 1997 and lasted for 49 sessions until 30 July of the same year. Miguel Ricart, the only defendant, was accused of kidnapping, rape, murder and illegal burial of three minors. He was sentenced to 170 years in prison in a highly mediatised trial. He was also ordered to pay the costs of the trial and compensation of 300 million pesetas to the victims' families.
Despite the efforts of Miriam's father, Fernando, to collect enough signatures to change the law on prison sentences for rapists, and although it was passed, Ricartdo served only 21 years in prison before being released in application of the Parot doctrine.