Murder of Gabriel Cruz
disappearance and murder of an 8 year old child in Spain.
The murder of Gabriel Cruz, also known as Operación Nemo, refers to the events related to the disappearance of Gabriel Cruz Ramírez, aged 8, on the afternoon of 27 February 2018 in Almería, Andalusia, Spain.
Cruz disappeared while travelling from his grandmother's residence to his cousins', only 100 metres (330 ft) away, and remained missing for twelve days. A search and rescue operation consisting of over 5,000 people, including 3,000 volunteers and 2,000 professionals, was established. It was the largest coordinated search for a missing person in Spanish history.
On 11 March 2018, Cruz's body was found in the boot of a vehicle belonging to Ana Julia Quezada, who was his father's partner at the time. Quezada had killed and buried Cruz on a farm owned by his father's family in the town of Rodalquilar, and had dug up and transported the body to her home in La Puebla de Vícar when she was detained by the Civil Guard. She confessed to the crime two days later.
In September 2019, Ana Julia Quezada was found guilty of murder.
Context
In February 2018, Gabriel Cruz was living with his grandmother in the town of Las Hortichuelas, located in the heart of the Cabo de Gata-Níjar Natural Park in Almería, Andalusia, Spain. On 27 February, at 3.30pm, Cruz left his grandmother's house to go play at his cousins' house, which was located 100 metres (330 ft) away.
The public source identifies “Murder of Gabriel Cruz” as disappearance and murder of an 8 year old child in Spain. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Murder, Gabriel and Cruz.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Feb 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q50435529. Authority coordinates are 36.874, -2.029. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2018 and 2019.
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This entry incorporates text from “Murder of Gabriel Cruz” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.