Father Arrested in Lanzarote in Infant Death Case After Head Injury. A court in Arrecife has sent the father to pre-trial detention without bail. He is suspected of causing a fatal injury to his 23-day-old son. The man admitted to aggressively shaking the baby's chair and did not rule out that a blow may have occurred.
A court in Arrecife (Province of Las Palmas) has ordered the detention without bail of a man suspected in the death of his own newborn son. The tragedy occurred in April: the 23-day-old infant died in a Gran Canaria hospital after being airlifted from Lanzarote with a severe traumatic brain injury.
Details of the investigation
According to case files, on the morning of April 12 the father was transporting the child in a car seat in the front passenger seat of a Peugeot 207. When the baby began to cry, the man, by his own admission, could not handle the stress and violently shook the seat. When asked by investigators whether he might have struck the child on the head, the suspect did not rule out the possibility. After this, the infant began to turn blue and stopped breathing.
Despite his son's critical condition, the man did not immediately seek medical assistance. He drove for another 10 minutes, then shook the child again, who was already showing no signs of life, and only after that returned home. He did not inform the mother about what had happened. Only 24 minutes after leaving the house, the mother, seeing the baby's state, tried to perform resuscitation right in the car while on the way to the nearest medical center, which turned out to be closed.
Response of emergency services and case progress
The parents eventually sought help at the local police station, where a duty medical worker began providing emergency assistance until the ambulance arrived. The child was first taken to the Arrecife hospital, then transported by helicopter to Gran Canaria, where he died three days later. The forensic examination confirmed that death occurred due to acute oxygen deprivation in the brain, caused by a severe head injury.
The court classified the father's actions as intentional murder with the possible aggravating circumstance of familial relationship, since he was responsible for ensuring the child's protection. The ruling notes that the man had previously been prosecuted for driving without a license and continued to break the law despite his criminal record. The court also took into account the mother's testimony about the suspect's aggressive behavior and an earlier police incident involving domestic violence.
Risks and further steps
The judge pointed to a high risk of flight due to the severity of the potential punishment—up to 15 years in prison. The investigation is at an early stage, and the court considers it necessary to isolate the suspect to prevent pressure on witnesses and destruction of evidence. The decision to remand the suspect in custody can be appealed within three days.
The issue of child protection and domestic violence remains pressing in Spain. Other regions of the country have also seen alarming incidents involving minors: for example, over the past year, there have been suicide attempts and mass escapes reported at one of Madrid's centers for underage migrants, highlighting the complexity of protecting vulnerable groups.
