Tenerife deep-water search continues for body of girl, 1, believed thrown into sea by vengeful father
Judge says Tomás Gimeno wanted to cause his former partner ‘the greatest pain imaginable’ by killing their children
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Your support makes all the difference.Authorities in Spain continue to search the waters off the coast of Tenerife for the body of a one-year-old girl believed to have been killed and thrown in the sea by her father.
On Thursday, the body of Anna Gimeno Zimmermann’s six-year-old sister Olivia was found in a bag tied to an anchor.
Another bag was also discovered thousands of feet below the surface, but it was empty.
The two girls went missing on 27 April, after allegedly being kidnapped by their father Tomás Gimeno, 37.
Gimeno, who is presumed dead by the Spanish Civil Guard, is thought to have then killed them at his house in Igueste de Candelaria, before taking out his boat to dump their bodies in the ocean.
His vessel was discovered the next day drifting off Puertito de Güímar, located on the east side of the island.
An investigating judge released a report on Saturday suggesting that Gimeno had murdered his children to cause “the greatest pain imaginable” to his former partner, the children’s mother Beatriz Zimmermann.
He “sought to create uncertainty” by hiding their corpses in places “he thought that they would never be found”, according to the court document.
“All of this after announcing to his ex-wife, as well as his relatives, that he was leaving with Olivia and Anna and that they would never be seen again,” it added.
Ms Zimmermann released a letter on social media earlier this week thanking the public for its support and calling the murder of her daughters “the most monstrous act that a person can commit”.
“Anna and Olivia were full of love, every day I told them every moment that I loved them very much,” she wrote.
She said she would “fight against these injustices and [for] the welfare of children”.
Following the discovery of Olivia’s body, Spanish prime minister Pedro Sanchez paid his condolences, saying he “cannot imagine” the pain Ms Zimmermann must be going through.
The tragedy has led to protests around Spain against gender-based violence.
María Gámez, director of the Civil Guard. has previously described the search effort as “complex” because of the size of the area being inspected.
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