Two tragic cases highlights a disturbing pattern of gender-based violence that has reignited a fierce national conversation in Spain. Both incidents involve foreign nationals — an Algerian man in Xilxes, Valencia, and a Moroccan man in Calella, Barcelona — and occur against the backdrop of a leaked police report suggesting the imminent legalization of roughly 1.3 million undocumented migrants.
In Xilxes, the community is mourning a woman and her 12-year-old child after the Civil Guard arrested her 39-year-old Algerian husband for breaking a restraining order. Police believe he slashed both their throats. According to investigation sources, the victims belonged to a family of deaf people well known in the town, according to Diario de Sevilla.
🇪🇸🚨Spain's immigration crisis highlighted by two new brutal crimes.
An Algerian father has been accused of murdering his 49-year-old Spanish ex-wife and their 12-year-old daughter in Xilxes. Both victims, found with their throats slashed, were deaf and mute.
In Barcelona, a… pic.twitter.com/LdYhT3zY40
— Remix News & Views (@RMXnews) February 18, 2026The woman was already integrated into the Viogen system, a specialized tracking network for gender-based violence, where her situation had been recently assessed as a “medium risk.”
The suspect had been issued a restraining order that was supposed to remain in effect until 2027, following a previous arrest for sexist violence last year. The judicial police are now working to clarify how the suspect was able to bypass legal protections to commit what appears to be a double crime.
Attack in Barcelona
Similarly, in Calella, a 24-year-old Moroccan man was arrested after a brutal attack that left his partner in a state of brain death and her mother in critical condition. The man is alleged to have used a blunt object to smash the daughter’s skull in, leaving her in a state of brain death.
The alleged perpetrator had been a fugitive for weeks until he was finally located in Onil after the Criminal Investigation Division issued a search and arrest warrant for double attempted murder, according to La Gaceta.
The events generated a strong social alarm in the area, where neighbors reported the extreme violence of the attack.
Police eventually managed to identify and proceed to arrest him when they verified that he had a court order in force, highlighting yet another case where a suspect with a known legal history committed an act of extreme violence.
1.3 million illegal migrants could be legalized
These types of cases have become central to a heated national debate in Spain following a leaked police report regarding the legalization of up to 1.3 million migrants. While the government officially estimated that 500,000 people would benefit from a new regularization decree, a confidential risk analysis from the National Centre for Immigration and Borders (CNIF) suggests the number could be more than double that figure.
These incidents have provided political ammunition for those critical of the mass regularization plan described in the leaked police document. Opponents argue that the 1.3 million figure, which includes roughly 250,000 to 350,000 asylum seekers, represents a risk to public order that the state is not prepared to manage.
The leaked report warns of a powerful pull factor and expresses fear of administrative collapse within immigration units. Critics use the cases in Xilxes and Calella to question whether the government can adequately vet such a large number of applicants, especially when current systems like Viogen failed to prevent the tragedy of a woman who was already known to be at risk
Foreigners vastly overrepresented in crime
As Remix News reported last year, the CEU-CEFAS Demographic Observatory report, titled “Demography of Crime in Spain,” examines the evolution of crime across various demographic groups and geographical areas in the country, and the researchers are warning about “imported crime” due to mass immigration.
Some of the key findings indicate that foreigners, who make up 31 percent of Spain’s prison population, commit per capita 500 percent more rapes and 414 percent more murders than Spanish citizens. The highest rates are seen among Arabs and Latinos, with many of them hailing from countries in South America known for their extremely high crime rates.
On a more regional level, the crime statistics are equally alarming. The Ertzaintza, the autonomous police force of Spain’s Basque Country, published its first report ever on the origin of detainees, with the data showing that 64 percent are foreigners, despite foreigners only making up approximately 14.1 percent of the population.
There were 80,111 crimes between January and September 2024, with 64.21 percent of those arrested being foreign nationals and 35 percent identified as Spanish.
For serious crimes like intentional homicide or murder, foreigners committed 53.8 percent of all such crimes. A total of 13 people were arrested and three were investigated. Six of those arrested were Spanish (either Basque or from other regions of Spain), and seven were foreigners. Two were from Maghreb and five from Latin America.
For sexual assault, foreigners were responsible for 68 percent of all cases.
For robbery with force, foreigners were responsible for 68.6 percent of cases.
For robbery with violence or intimidation, they committed 81.9 percent of all cases.
