"He did not commit suicide": a father's fight to prove that his daughter was the victim of a sexist murder
The Ana Buza case was archived only 36 hours after the events, but now it has been reopened and is reaching trial
BarcelonaAna Buza Mira was only 18 years old when she started dating Rafael, who was 26. A year later, in the early hours of September 7, 2019, she was found dead behind the safety fence of the A-4, a highway near the town of Carmona, in Seville. Rafael explained to the police that the young woman had jumped from the vehicle he was driving. At 7:30 in the morning, a pair of civil guards woke Antonio and his wife with the words no parent would ever want to hear: "Your daughter has died under strange circumstances." "I went crazy," explains Antonio to ARA.
Just 36 hours after Ana's death, the case was closed as a suicide. According to the girl's father, the judge in charge of the case accepted Rafael's version as true without waiting for the autopsy results or the reports from the Traffic agents.
Twelve days later, Antonio received an email from who had been the academic advisor to Ana, a brilliant student. The woman, also a psychologist, explained that, six months before dying, the young woman had contacted her because she wanted her to treat her partner, describing him as having jealous and manipulative behaviors and violent attitudes. “The last session they had was three days before her death,” explain sources close to the case.
Shocked, the father went to the Carmona courts to demand the reopening of the case, but claims that the judge refused to listen to him. “It is very clear that your daughter committed suicide,” he says she told him. A few words that marked the beginning of a struggle to clarify what happened on the night of September 7. “I am sure that this man ran over my daughter,” Antonio has asserted on several occasions.
Up to four versions of the events
One of the elements that has aroused the most suspicion is the different versions that Rafael gave to the Civil Guard agents that night. The young man gave up to four different interpretations of the events: first he explained that he had lost control of the car because an animal had crossed his path, and later he claimed that Ana had jumped from the moving car. The boy attributed the suicide to an argument with her father about her grades –even though she was a brilliant student– and, in another version, to financial problems, even though she came from a wealthy family.
When reviewing what had happened on the night of September 7, Antonio claims that he detected several shortcomings in the investigation. Rafael, the only witness, was not detained, the images from a video surveillance camera were not consulted, and the phones or the car were not initially examined. No traffic sketch was drawn up either, and it took the family 45 days to find out the exact point where the body had appeared. “No one explained or asked her anything,” explain sources close to Ana's father.
The Buza family also report difficulties in accessing evidence and autopsy photographs. “Everything has been achieved through appeals,” says Antonio. Finally, the Seville Court ordered the case to be reopened in November 2019, although it was not until 2023 that the case was transferred to a Court of Violence against Women in Seville.
Accident reconstruction
A mathematician by profession, Antonio questioned from the beginning whether his daughter could have jumped from a car traveling at 117 km/h. Several teams of accident reconstruction and engineering experts reproduced the events with a vehicle identical to Rafael's, and concluded that it was impossible to open the door “at an angle sufficient to throw oneself out.” Three forensic doctors hired by the Buza family also considered that the injuries were consistent with being run over. “It is the only way to explain the injuries my daughter had,” Antonio has always maintained. Ana's body had fractures to both femurs and her right tibia, which, according to these reports, indicates that she impacted against the highway safety barrier.
The Buza family's fight ended up changing the course of the case. Rafael went from testifying as a witness to being under investigation, and in 2024 he was prosecuted for reckless homicide. However, five magistrates of the Provincial Court of Seville reviewed the case and considered that there was enough evidence to suggest a possible intentional hit-and-run. The "state of the victim's body," the damage to the vehicle, and Rafael's “implausible” statements led the Court to order that the case be tried as a possible intentional homicide before a jury. Now the Prosecutor's Office is requesting three years in prison for reckless homicide, while the Buza family is demanding 20 for murder. Meanwhile, Rafael remains at liberty and was admitted to an entrance examination for the Seville Local Police.
On September 18, more than seven years after her death, a jury will determine whether Ana's death was a sexist murder and will give the case a new opportunity.
