The case of Sheyla Cóndor, murdered and dismembered by a police officer with a record as serial rapist, whom she met on the Internet, has moved the country, and not only because of the bloody nature of the crime, but also because of the police’s disdain for the pleas of the young woman’s mother when she reported her disappearance.

The police told her that, since her daughter was an adult, she was probably having an affair and would return home soon. They ignored the woman’s pleas until she told them she had checked the young woman’s computer and found a conversation of her arranging a meeting with the man who, when she resisted being raped, killed her and then dismembered her body.

When the police finally checked the rapist’s home, they found the girl’s remains packed in a suitcase and two backpacks. Days later the murderer was found in a hotel, where he had hanged himself.

The police’s disregard for the credibility of reports of missing women seems to be recurrent and is one of the factors that prevents timely actions that can prevent femicides.

These events prompted the Minister for Women, Teresa Hernández, to declare: “We cannot tolerate any kind of negligence in an institution created to register, investigate and punish reports of violence” against women.

In Peru, femicides have increased since 2009, from 139 to 170 annually in 2023. So far in 2024, 132 such crimes have been recorded, with the perpetrators being in most cases partners or ex-partners of the victims.

Five feminist and human rights groups today released a statement signed by more than a hundred different social organizations calling for “urgent reforms in the police system to guarantee adequate care for survivors and family members who report” disappearances of women.

The document warns that it is the obligation of the authorities to prioritize and strengthen specialized care services that, it states, are abandoned and are “the first line of support for victims of violence.”

ied/arc/mrs