Ana Julia Quezada found guilty of Gabriel Cruz's murder

Ana Julia Quezada, 45, originally from the Dominican Republic but a Spanish citizen who has lived in the country since 1995, had been in a relationship with Gabriel Cruz Ramírez's father, Ángel Cruz, for a few months before the child's death in the Las Hortichuelas area of Níjar, Almería province.

The little boy – a huge fan of fish and sea-life who wanted to be a marine biologist when he grew up – had left his grandmother's house, where he spent most weekends and holidays, at 15.30 on February 27 to go to his aunt's and cousins' house to play.

Even though his destination was 100 metres away, he never arrived, and was reported missing.

A two-week manhunt involving police, volunteers, police dogs and the boy's family – including his mother Patricia Ramírez, who is divorced from Ángel Cruz – ensued, and detectives say they had always been looking for a living person, whom they believed to have been abducted.

Suspicions were aroused when Ana Julia found one of Gabriel's vests on the ground, where it had not been seen before, and tried to frame an ex-boyfriend living in Almería.

On March 11, police followed Ana Julia from the empty country house she and Ángel were renovating to her flat in Vícar, Almería, and ordered her to open the boot.

The sight of Gabriel's body was too much for the experienced homicide detectives, who broke down in tears.

Ana Julia maintained she had passed the boy en route to the country house in her car and told him to accompany her there as she was going to do some painting, and that once on site, he had started playing with a broken axe.

She claimed she told him to put it down as he would hurt himself, and that he called her an 'ugly black woman' and said she 'couldn't tell him what to do'.

The accused alleged a struggle followed when she tried to wrench the axe from the child and that she put her hand over his mouth to 'stop him shouting and insulting her', then panicked when she realised he had stopped breathing, and went along with the search – even reassuring the boy's mother and father that they would 'soon find him' and he would be 'home and drinking coca-cola' before long – since she did not know what to do.

Ana Julia also says she had taken prescribed tranquillisers and did not have much recollection of the incident, which she says is an 'accident' for which she has 'begged forgiveness' from the parents and 'all of Spain'.

Forensic examinations found blood in the car boot and injuries consistent with a brutal beating with a blunt object, and Patricia and Ángel said Gabriel would 'never' have insulted 'anyone' the way his father's girlfriend described, even though it is known he and Ana Julia did not get on, and that he was a quiet, sensitive and polite little boy.

Investigations into Ana Julia's background revealed she was 'obsessed with money', the Burgos-born father of her 26-year-old daughter had noticed 'strange symptoms' consistent with being drugged during their relationship in the mid-1990s, which immediately stopped once they split up, and a later boyfriend, who had died, was reportedly robbed and swindled whilst on his death bed, according to his family.

Sources from her family and former social circles claimed she was highly-controlling and had little capacity for empathy, and her daughter refused to see her during the trial, revealing her mother had called her asking her to provide an alibi.

Ana Julia had wanted Ángel to move back to the Dominican Republic with her, and was not happy when he said he could not leave Spain while Gabriel was young.

The court considers Ana Julia felt Gabriel was 'in the way' of her relationship with Ángel.

She has been described as a 'cold-blooded killer', and forensics believed she had beaten Gabriel with a heavy, blunt object for 'between 45 and 90 minutes', then suffocated him when she saw he was still breathing.

The jury, the majority of whom were women, did not consider this to have been proven, nor that the accused had taken medication inhibiting her awareness of the nature and quality of her actions, nor that she 'deliberately sought to maximise the victim's suffering'.

They considered it proven, however, that the accused used excessive force in knowingly suffocating Gabriel by covering his nose and mouth, and that she had either thrown him to the ground or pushed him against a wall before, giving him no chance to defend himself.

Jury members found that the killing was deliberate and premeditated and, as her victim is a child, the crime automatically qualifies for permanent reviewable prison.

This type of sentence – which the socialist government wants to abolish and which has been the subject of a huge national campaign to maintain – is not the same as life imprisonment, but means the offender is kept in jail until he or she is deemed fully rehabilitated.

It means a dangerous criminal who is not safe to be allowed out into the community can be kept in prison for life, but if he or she eventually becomes fully reformed and no risk to the public, release is possible as soon as this verdict is agreed.

Now Ana Julia Quezada has been found guilty, she will be sentenced next week, and it is very likely she will be the first woman in Spain to be subject to a permanent reviewable custodial term.