The murder of Pedro Rodríguez, known as a crime by the Guardia Urbana, took place in 2017, but due to the beauty of the terrible murder, many books have been written about the case and two series have been released on different platforms.
We live in a fashion, a kind of fever for true crime, true crimes, adapted into documentaries or converted into series. The murder of the Barcelona policeman Pedro Rodríguez, is a crime in the media, but Manu Marlasca and Luis Rendueles bring us the true story of that crime and also the controversy because the killer, the urban guard Rosa Peral, tried to stop. the premiere.
Let’s start at the end if you want. Rosa Peral, sentenced to 25 years in prison for the murder of her ex-husband, Pedro Rodríguez, both municipal police officers, urban guards in Barcelona, who tried without success to stop the broadcast of the series that included his story and his murder. partner.. Why? and why didn’t he achieve?
Rosa Peral, who like her lover, Albert López, is in prison, serving his sentence for the murder of his ex-husband, presented a request to the judge to stop the premiere of the series about the murder. He admitted that he had not seen the series and wanted to do so before the premiere because he might file a lawsuit for invasion of his honor and privacy.
The judge of number 54 in Barcelona rejected his claim, but did not go into the substance of the matter. Just for form. Rosa Peral, the killer, did not live in Barcelona before entering the prison, so her request or request to stop the premiere must have been made in the city of her last home, Vilanova i la Geltrú.
Rosa Peral’s lawyer, Nuria González, explained that this request was also made in a court there, but it was also rejected, this time because she could not pay the first bail. The lawyer says that his client is in the red, remember that the sentence sentenced him, in addition to 25 years in prison, to pay 400,000 euros to the family of his victim. Her lawyer says that Rosa Peral will only charge 120 euros per month for her work in the prison locker. He complained that in the series, as seen in the trailer, his young daughters appeared.
The series was finally released and also a documentary, called ‘The Tapes of Rosa Peral’ where, surprisingly, the collaboration of this woman, convicted of murder, is important.
It is true that this case has generated, as far as we know, two books and two series on different platforms. We do not know the pending accounts between Rosa Peral and the production company, nor the agreements they have or do not have in the future. On other occasions, the killers are happy to tell their story, their version. Sometimes they even register their story with the patent office so that they have the right to any book or film made about them. Then, sometimes, let’s say they are not happy with the result and problems arise.
It must not be easy to negotiate the rights to a series or documentary on murderers.
This is a delicate and fascinating subject. The first risk, which even happened to Truman Capote, is that they will be attracted, they will attract, they will be drawn into their territory. Some are very intelligent, Rosa Peral is a clear case. Her ability to seduce, especially men, was evident before the crime was committed. And, as they told us, he has continued to do so since he was in prison, where he learned how to attract many people.
We did not see the series about the assassination of Pedro Rodríguez, but when it was made into a fictional series there were two risks. The first, that the matter focuses on the killers and not on the victim, is something that, I fear, will happen. And secondly, the beautification of crime, of criminals. It is a cinema classic. Killers are usually not as attractive as Juliette Lewis in “Natural Born Killers” or as charismatic as Anthony Hopkins in “The Silence of the Lambs.” In a Spanish movie about a prison worker who falls in love with Juan José Garfia, a dangerous prisoner, the role is played by Emma Suárez, who doesn’t have much to do with the worker’s physicality, really. This time, the role of the murderer, Albert, was played by a very handsome actor, Quim Gutiérrez, and that of the murderer Rosa Peral was played by Úrsula Corberó. We left it there.
Well, the series and the documentary are available for those who want to see them. Let’s go to the facts, to the reality. The crime of the Urban Guard. It happened in 2017 in the province of Barcelona.
The chronology of crime
On May 4 of that year, 2017, a car, a Volkswagen Golf GTI, caught fire next to the Foix reservoir or reservoir, in the province of Barcelona. Inside the trunk of that car was a body engulfed in flames. However, the fire and accelerated gasoline did not destroy the prosthesis worn by the victim on his back. It serves to identify the body of Pedro Rodríguez, an agent of the Barcelona Urban Police.
As we know here, the first thing that the investigators look at, in this case the Mossos d’Esquadra, is the victim’s environment, the people closest to him in his life.
That is. Pedro Rodríguez, the victim, had a companion, also a police officer of the Barcelona Urban Police, Rosa Peral. They both live with Rosa’s two daughters with her ex-husband, Rubén, a policeman. Pedro has a son from a previous marriage. He explained to the police that he did not report the disappearance because they had an argument and he believed that after this he would go home.
The investigation soon led to a stormy relationship between the victim Pedro and his partner Rosa. And the third figure appeared, Albert, also a city guard.
Rosa and Albert worked together, as patrolmen, some time ago. They had a close relationship in 2013. At that time Rosa was still married to Rubén, the policeman. She discovered the infidelity and decided to separate in 2016. At that time, Rosa began her relationship with Pedro, also a co-worker. And he continued the one he had, forever, with Albert.
This is what he said in the trial, when he defended that the crime was committed by his lover, Albert, out of jealousy towards his spouse, Pedro.
In other black territories that the listeners may consult, you explained to us that evidence and what was the trial against Rosa and Albert. The court did not believe that version. He does not believe that Rosa is afraid of her lover and that she is innocent of her spouse’s crime.
No. There is a lot of data against that. Among the scene of the crime, which is the house where Rosa and Pedro live. There were traces of the victim’s blood there. The calls and messages between the two, placing their phones next to the swamp where they left the car with the body. In the trial, the two end up blaming each other… Everything shows that the situation, let’s say the love and sexual triangle, went out of control for Rosa before the murder. On April 8, 2017, three weeks before Pedro was killed, Albert entered a cafe in Barcelona and handed Rosa a small box containing a solitaire in front of his partner. He said to him, “so you can think about it.”
That classmate testified in the trial that Rosa put the ring on her hand. On the other hand, in those days the woman was wearing another ring given by her official partner, Pedro. At the end of that month, Rosa told her friend that she decided to stay with Pedro and reject Albert because “he dresses better and he flirts better.” This is not true, according to the testimonies and photos seen later.
The relationship between the two lovers continues to be intense after the murder of Pedro.
They called up to thirty times a day, until they realized that the police investigation was directed against them and then they cut off communication. Until that moment, the messages were affectionate, even grateful, and Rosa’s invitations to Albert to stop by her house were also frequent.
There is a symbolic image of that relationship, a photo in which the two condemned men, Rosa and Albert, can be seen at a dinner with friends.
That meal, on the occasion of a colleague’s retirement, and that photo, were taken while Pedro’s body was burning in the trunk of the car where they left it, next to the swamp. Rosa stuck out her tongue at the cell phone camera and Albert, who was shaving his hair and beard after eating, looked calm.
Both were arrested immediately. They placed the mobile phones next to the swamp where the victim’s body was found, among others. They were sentenced to 25 and 20 years in prison.
Rosa received a heavier sentence because of the aggravating relationship with the victim, because she was with him. There are many facts about his life before and after the crime that show him to be a very interesting person from a criminal or criminal point of view. At work, she makes up a false story where she pretends to be the victim, to blame a sub-inspector with whom she had an affair. She reported him because, she said, he distributed erotic images of her. The truth is that the image, it turns out, was distributed by Rosa herself, who has a relationship with her boss in a story that never ends well.
After the crime of Pedro, Rosa Peral, so to speak, opened a new path, again with a man, a neighbor of hers who had sex with her and sent her erotic images when she was not find the body of his partner.
Beyond her erotic episodes, which are appropriate because this is the tool used by this woman to get what she wants, her character is also reflected in the messages she exchanges, after the crime, with Pedro’s former partner, the victim .
Rosa Peral explained to the mother of Pedro’s son, whom they killed, that she understands his pain and feels very close to him. He wrote things like “it only calms me down to kill the person who did this. The death penalty is necessary here in Spain. The thing is that if the person who did that comes and I have a gun in my hands, I kill him and put him on a tree,” where he offers himself as some kind of street vigilante.
Also in Julia’s wave
With the same coolness, Rosa Peral also wrote to him telling him her hypothesis about the murder in which he participated: “I don’t think it’s just one man. “There must be at least two of them because to defeat Pedro . .. I can’t imagine anyone strong enough to finish him.”
