“THESE CAN’T BE MY DAUGHTER’S BONES”

I return today to Spain’s missing babies. The majority of cases relate to between the 1950s and 70s although some reports are from the 80s. Hence most come from the Franco era when mothers suspect their babies were taken from them at birth and sold or passed to adoptive families.


The spotlight first fell on the cases from La Línea de la Concepción, the border town with Gibraltar, although there are now numerous reports from throughout Spain. The La Línea court is investigating along with the Algeciras Prosecutor and the National Police some 105 suspected such thefts. I highlight the case today of Remedios.

Once these cases were taken up by the legal system it was clear whatever the outcome for each family it would be traumatic. If they found a lost son or daughter alive and well it would be traumatic for all concerned. The opening of a tomb to ascertain whether it contained any remains would be traumatic. For Remedios the discovery of the bones in her daughter’s niche at Estepona’s cemetery has been very traumatic indeed.

In June the La Línea court ordered niches at the local cemetery, which were claimed to be the final resting places of three of these babes, to be opened with the remains taken for forensic tests. On June 29, again on the orders of a La Línea judge, the same process was undertaken at Estepona’s cemetery.

Remedios had given birth to a daughter on November 16 1981 at the then Residencia Sanitara in La Línea. As she was from Estepona, some 30 kilometres from La Línea, when her baby supposedly died shortly after birth, principally from lack of oxygen, she insisted her remains were interred in her local cemetery.

Now we come to the harrowing cry from Remedios: “These can’t be my daughter’s bones.” She was given just two hours notice to go to Estepona cemetery to meet the judge, Judicial Police officers, two forensic scientists and cemetery workers. The burial ground was sealed off and niche 26 opened. She said she had been waiting months for this moment but instead of closure she is left with torment.

Inside the tomb were the remains of a complete skeleton but Remedios asks, my daughter – also named Remedios – was hours old, how could she have such a complete skeleton? At the back of the mummified mouth are clearly tooth sockets. The ribs are four centimetres long and a centimetre wide, the size of her finger – how can this be asks Remedios when my baby just weighed two and a half kilos? The remains also had the legs crossed in an apparent effort to cram the large baby in to a small casket.

Whether this is the baby of Remedios will be determined by DNA tests being carried out at the Instituto de Medicina Legal in Sevilla. After her baby died officials at La Línea hospital offered to bury it at no charge – as has been the case with other missing babies – but she and her husband declined. The remains were taken at their request to Estepona but the parents were not allowed to see the body. Her sister-in-law asked to see the baby too but the undertaker refused saying it wasn’t allowed – an action Remedios described as inhumane and a violation of their rights.

There is one intriguing difference in this case. The gynaecologist who delivered Remedios’ baby and declared it dead is still working at a medical practice in La Línea. If the DNA tests show the remains are not the daughter of Remedios then the chief prosecutor in the Campo de Gibraltar, Juan Cisneros, who is leading the investigation, knows who to ask.

(Versions of the above article has appeared in Panorama, Dscriber (USA) and other publications)

SPANISH PROSECUTOR DEMANDS INVESTIGATION IN TO FRANCO’S MISSING BABIES

The numerous cases of babies that went missing shortly after their birth during the Franco era in Spain have now led the chief prosecutor of the nation’s High Court to write to the Ministry of Justice demanding a full investigation.

The cases date from 1940 and continued to just after Franco’s death in 1980. The chief prosecutor, Javier Zaragoza, has sent a letter to the minister of justice, Francisco Caamaño, to propose that the ministry opens a special office to handle the cases of those who believed their children or brothers and sisters have disappeared and to then seek a solution to their claims.

Zaragoza has called for an “administrative” investigation for the alleged crimes committed between 1940 and 1980. He wants the Ministry of Justice to locate the whereabouts of children reported missing and to investigate the false death certificates that were given to parents by hospitals at the time of supposed demise of their child – these parents suspect a false identity was then created for the baby.

Spain has introduced the ‘Ley de Memoria Histórica’ which was approved by parliament in 2007 but whilst it deals with the victims of the Civil War (1936-39) and during the era of the dictator Francisco Franco (1939 – 75) it does not include the children who disappeared during the ‘Franquismo’ period.

The letter from the chief prosecutor Javier Zaragoza was sent to the ministry just 15 days after he’d met with the families of the Grupos de Afectados de Clínicas de Toda España that had reported “hundreds of cases” of snatchings of recently born babies from Spanish clinics where the parents were told their infant had died.

However the actions of the chief prosecutor has been criticised by the Asociación para la Recuperación de la Memoría Histórica that represents the families of those who were victims of the Franco era. In a communiqué the association says the case should be far more that an “administrative” investigation. It points to: “the theft of the babies that have been kidnapped and these boys and girls are kidnap victims” and that has not been stated in the prosecutor’s letter. It is obvious a serious crime is involved; hence it should be a “criminal” investigation.

The Spanish judge Baltasar Garzón has previously stressed the need to investigate these thefts of children and opened a brief case in 2008 which suggested that 113,000 babies disappeared during the Civil War and the years of ‘Franquismo’. Garzón’s investigation was brought to a halt after the extreme right went to court to seek a ruling he had no competence in the matter. Garzón was suspended from his post on a temporary basis in May of this year – but the judge spoke out about the systematic kidnapping of the children of Republican prisoners who for more than 60 years have not had the minimum investigation into their case.

Garzón is of the opinion that there could have developed a system for the disappearance of minors, the children of Republican mothers (the dead, prisoners, executed, exiled or simply disappeared) for several years from 1937 to 1950, which at the time were carried out under the umbrella of apparent legality. The official records speak of 30,000 children being adopted during the 40s and 50s with cases largely handled by religious institutions.

Of course those responsible are now either very elderly or deceased and the records, if they exists, will be in archives. However many of the children will still be alive but unaware of their true identity or that their parents and brothers and sisters are searching for them.

(Photo: Baltasar Garzón)

(A version of the above article appeared in the Morning Star on December 12 2010)

FRANCO’S 30,000 STOLEN BABIES

La Línea is the Spanish town that has grown up across the border from Gibraltar at the tip of southern Spain. Over the years Spaniards have flocked to the town to seek work in the dock and ship yards plus the other booming businesses of Gibraltar. This is relevant to what follows because it means the itinerant husbands and wives did not have their families to support them in the event of giving birth or a child’s death.

Last November Cristina Díaz Carrasco broke the astonishing tale of her brother’s possible disappearance from La Línea hospital in 1967 to the media. He was said to have died shortly after his birth. As her mother was from Irún in Northern Spain and had no family in the area his body was buried by the hospital. The family returned each summer and left flowers on what was presumed to be his grave. However after works at the cemetery in 1980 the grave could not be found and it was subsequently discovered that there were no records at the cemetery, the Civil Registry or the archives of his birth, death or interment.

It was an interesting story but I presumed a one off. Not so because since Cristina made her suspicions public at least five other families have come forward with a similar tale in La Línea.

One of the latest involves a woman named Carmen from the Canary Islands. She came to La Línea in 1968 with her husband to work. She arrived pregnant and fearing all was not well sought medical aid. On November 14, 1968 she gave birth at the private Inmaculada Clinic to a son who she was told soon died.

Neither Carmen nor her husband had any family in La Línea and the hospital told them not to worry it would take care of everything. It was when her daughter saw Cristina Díaz Carrasco on the Antena 3 TV programme ‘Espejo Público’ and they discussed it she found their situations had been very similar and just a year apart.

She had never visited La Línea cemetery to visit the grave of her son but now she decided to make the trip. Again no grave could be found nor did the cemetery have any records of such a baby having been buried there in November of 1968. She also visited the Archivo Histórico Municipal in La Línea which holds the records from that time. There is no record of his birth, death or burial.

One might argue that this were cases of poor record keeping except that in wider Spain during the Franco era it has been established that children were indeed taken from their parents without their knowledge and passed on to an adoptive family.

It is reported Judge Baltasar Garzón has estimated that during the post war period of the Franco dictatorship a staggering 30,000 babies were re-allocated in this way. Garzón has reached that conclusion by gleaning facts and figures from various studies. It has also been reported that 200,000 pesetas was the price of acquiring such a baby in the 1960s. In his book – Mala gente que camina – Benjamín Prado says that in Spain people think “such things only happened in Argentina or Chile which had much shorter dictatorships. The courts do not want to investigate in case the same thing happened here.”

In Madrid in the 1960s one of the standard jokes amongst children was to say to their parents “did you buy me in the Rastro?” However Prado points out that many did just that – bought them at the market - and hence many Spaniards do not know their true parentage or indeed who they are.

Now there are many web pages and social networks on this theme. The problem is that the Andalucía health system that runs the present hospital La Línea didn’t exist then and the birth and death records are in archives with those involved in recording them long since retired or deceased. However the thirst for the truth amongst the 40-year-olds is strong and they will not be silenced until the truth is uncovered.

As I wrote this article the prosecutor in Algeciras – the nearest major town to La Línea - has decided to open an investigation into these local disappearances. Chief prosecutor, Juan Cisneros, has accepted the official reports by six families that involve births at the then municipal hospital in La Línea as well as two private clinics in the town. Cisneros says these cases have to be investigated to find answers for the families involved and determine just what happened in the last century.

All the affected families have now joined an association called Anadir formed by Antonio Barroso. He was adopted and suspects he was stolen from his true parents. The lawyer Enrique Vila is taking all these cases to the High Court both in Cádiz and in Spain where there are dozens more. However it has to be recognised that because of the time that has passed any investigation will be difficult to pursue a fact that was recently stressed by the head prosecutor in the Cádiz court, Ángeles Ayuso.

(Photo: Cristina Díaz Carrasco's grandmother supposedly with the body of her brother in La Línea hospital's mortuary).

(The above article appeared in The Morning Star in July 2010 and parts have appeared in Panorama in May and June 2010).