The shooting death of a 15-year-old minor in the Pegaso park in the Sant Andreu district of Barcelona has caused understandable social alarm for several reasons. The main one is the victim's age, practically a child, but the next is that the weapon used was a pistol. This is a particularly worrying fact because the Mossos have already detected an increase in the use of firearms related to organized or disorganized crime, and they consider it an absolute priority right now. Furthermore, the murder did not occur within the framework of a fight between groups of young people, nor was it an isolated incident, but rather the Mossos are working with the hypothesis that the homicide or homicides expressly went to look for the victim and shot them with a firearm with the intention of killing.

Wednesday was the Day of the Squads, the coming-out day for the Catalan police and an occasion when the heads of the Mossos d'Esquadra take stock and share future security challenges in a packed auditorium of officers. Chief Commissioner Miquel Esquius mentioned drug trafficking and extremism as the main challenges for the country. But he also highlighted a third element that has been the focus of the leadership for months: youth violence.