The Regional Supreme Court has ratified a 23-year prison sentence for Javier Stephan I.M. in Almería for having murdered his wife using a pickaxe. The 31-year-old condemned man had inflicted 24 blows with a small pickaxe to the victim’s head, before making sure of his intentions by slitting her throat.

His defence lawyer had lodged an appeal, which the high-court magistrates had rejected as it was apparent that the man had acted with ensañamiento, means that the act was done in such a manner as to cause the maximum suffering for the victim; i.e., cruelty or malice.

The court finding included, “He could have brought about her death by other less painful means, such as with a knife, which he finally resorted to,” adding, “but his intentions of killing her were accompanied by a desire to unnecessarily increase her suffering.”

The murder took place on the 18th of February of 2010. Javier Stephan had found out five days previously that she was having an affair. On the day of the incident there had been a strong argument at their home in Calle Poeta Gonzalo de Berceo, where they lived with their two young children.

Suddenly, the man grabbed the pickaxe, which he had hidden beforehand under a mattress and struck her on the head with it. She fell to the floor and he, “taking advantage of the fact that she could not move,” inflicted a further 23 other such blows to her head as she twisted to escape from him.

(News: Almeria, Andalucia)