Gilberto Antonio Chamba Jaramillo was sentenced twice, in two countries, for killing young women. In Ecuador in 1993 he confessed to the deaths of eight young women and girls in and around the coastal city of Machala, and received 16 years. Released early in 2000 under a sentence-remission law, he moved to Spain with a certificate that showed no criminal record. Four years later, in Lleida, he killed María Isabel Bascuñana Royo, a 21-year-old law student. The Audiencia Provincial de Lleida sentenced him in November 2006 to 45 years, and the Tribunal Supremo confirmed the conviction in 2007. In November 2024 he was in a Catalan prison, with release expected in November 2029 and expulsion from Spain to follow.
The Ecuadorian press called him "el Monstruo de Machala", and Spanish reports have used the same name ever since. The case raised two sets of questions that were reported at length: how a man with his history could leave Ecuador with a clean record, and how Spanish officials came to give him legal residence without it.
Chamba was born in Machala, the capital of El Oro province in southern Ecuador, on October 5, 1963, according to two Infobae accounts. He served in the Ecuadorian army and left with the rank of corporal. El Telégrafo, the Guayaquil daily, gives the rank as cabo primero and says that in 1988, after leaving the army, he bought a taxi. Infobae's 2024 account says he joined at 21 and spent 14 years in uniform; its 2021 account says he left in 1988. The reports do not reconcile those figures.
He married, and the couple had two daughters. He drove his taxi mostly at night. Neighbors described him as a quiet man with a wife and children, El Telégrafo reported.
Between 1988 and 1993, by his own confession, Chamba killed eight women and girls in and around Machala. El Telégrafo, writing in 2014, said all of them were students, aged 14 to 22, and that two were girls of 14 and 16. Infobae's 2021 account gives the same age range. Infobae's 2024 account says he chose young women traveling alone, among them students, and that his work as a taxi driver gave him access to them.
El Telégrafo identified the first two victims, both killed in 1988, only as Cecilia C. and Rosa B., a university student. The reports give few other details about the women and girls as people, beyond their youth and their schooling. Several were strangled, according to the police account El Telégrafo summarized.
The police set up a special team after the first deaths, El Telégrafo reported, but the killings went on for several more years. Both El Telégrafo and Infobae report that he attended the wakes of some of the victims and offered his condolences to their families as an acquaintance; Infobae adds that he knew some of the women before he killed them.
Chamba was caught in 1993 when a woman he attacked escaped and went to the police. Infobae's 2024 account says she described a taxi driver, that a sketch was made, and that officers stopped him at a routine checkpoint because he matched it. Infobae's 2021 account says he was 30 when he was arrested.
The officers did not at first believe that the slightly built man in front of them was the man they were looking for, El Telégrafo said. He confessed in detail, and insisted on the order in which the killings had happened. He then led the police to the places where they had occurred. Fausto Terán, the police officer who led the case, described him to El Telégrafo as calculating, manipulative and sadistic.
Chamba was sentenced in 1993. El Telégrafo reported that he confessed to the eight deaths and was sentenced to 16 years of reclusión mayor. Infobae's 2024 account dates the sentence to November 1993.
He was sent to the old García Moreno prison, according to Infobae's 2021 account, and on July 5, 1997 he was moved to the municipal jail at Zaruma, about 100 kilometers from Machala. Infobae reported that he said he had been threatened by another prisoner at García Moreno. In prison he was a model inmate, Infobae's 2024 account says, and taught other prisoners to read and write.
He did not serve the 16 years. In 2000, Infobae reported, Ecuador's Congress passed a law on the remission of sentences, promoted by Claudio Mueckay, then acting as the national ombudsman, which cut most sentences in half; crimes against the public administration were excluded, but his were not. A further year was taken off in recognition of the Great Jubilee of 2000. Infobae's 2024 account says he left prison in March 2000 after about seven years. El Telégrafo attributes the release to the "2 por 1" rule, which it dates to 1998. Segre, the Lleida daily, describes the time served as about half of the sentence, and an EFE report printed in November 2024 gives it as eight years.
Under Ecuadorian law his criminal record was then cleared, Infobae reported. Segre has reported that he cleared it within three days and that on October 23, 2000 he obtained a passport and a certificate showing no criminal record. He later told the judges in Lleida that the documents had been issued in the normal way, without bribes.
Chamba asked two of his sisters who lived in Spain for help, and they met him at Madrid's Barajas airport when he arrived on November 9, 2000, El Telégrafo reported. El Universo gave the same date for his arrival from Ecuador. Infobae's 2024 account, citing the Madrid newspaper El Mundo, gives a different date: it says he reached Amsterdam by air on November 23, 2000.
He settled in Lleida, in Catalonia, where his sisters lived. He first lived with them and worked as a bricklayer's assistant and a cleaner, then rented a flat of his own, Infobae reported. El Telégrafo says he held various jobs, lived an outwardly ordinary life with his family and had several partners.
His residence was made legal on October 4, 2001, according to the El Mundo figures Infobae cited. Segre reported in November 2024 that the Spanish government's office in Lleida, the Subdelegación del Gobierno, granted him residence in 2001 even though his file lacked documents it should have contained, among them his criminal record from Ecuador. Because of that error the Ecuadorian record did not appear in his file, and he was able to renew his papers in the years that followed. The Bascuñana family was later compensated for the negligence, Segre reported.
In 2003 Chamba attacked a woman in Lleida. Infobae's 2024 account says she reported him to the police in October 2003 and that the complaint was not acted on; Segre dates the attack to the summer of 2003. He was later convicted of attempted murder, with a further charge, for that attack.
In September 2004 he took a job as a car park attendant in Lleida, Infobae reported.
María Isabel Bascuñana Royo was 21 and a law student at the University of Lleida.
On the night of November 23, 2004, after her last class ended at about 10:30 p.m., she sent her mother a message saying she would have a sandwich before coming home, according to Infobae; El Telégrafo says she called her parents to tell them she would not be home for dinner. She did not come home.
She was found in Lleida on November 25, 2004, according to the prosecution's case as El Universo reported it; Infobae's 2024 account says she was found the night after she disappeared. She had been strangled.
The Mossos d'Esquadra, the Catalan police, first spoke to Chamba as a witness. He said he did not remember the young woman and had noticed nothing unusual. He told officers he had left work at 9:15 p.m., eaten dinner and then helped the cinema cleaners at about 10:45 p.m., Infobae reported. As is usual, the investigators looked first at her family and the people closest to her.
Her friends changed the direction of the inquiry. They told the police that she had been uneasy about the way the car park attendant treated her. He had asked several young women who used the car park for their phone numbers, and some of them then received anonymous harassing calls, Infobae and El Telégrafo reported.
The Mossos arrested Chamba on December 1, 2004. The evidence that followed, as Infobae summarized it, included physical evidence linked to his workplace; the fact that nobody remembered seeing him at work at the time he said he had been there; a plane ticket to Ecuador that he had bought; and DNA evidence that matched his profile. Infobae's 2021 account adds fingerprint analysis, statements from women who knew the victim, the testimony of the second woman he had attacked, and contradictions in his own statements. He denied the killing and said the Mossos had conspired against him and planted the DNA evidence.
Spanish investigators did not at first know who he was. Days after the killing, the Ecuadorian press, whose files held the story of the Machala case, reported that the man arrested in Lleida had confessed to eight killings there, Infobae and Segre reported. The Ecuadorian and Catalan police confirmed that he was the man convicted in Machala.
Spanish officials were criticized for not having checked his record in Ecuador, Infobae reported, though it noted that the clean certificate itself had been issued in Ecuador. Police officers later testified that they had asked him whether he had a criminal record and that he had said no; Chamba denied that anyone had asked. The Ecuadorian consulate in Barcelona apologized to María Isabel's family on behalf of the Ecuadorian government, and the consul, Freddy Arellano, said that justice had to be done with all killers, whoever they were, Segre reported.
The trial opened before the Audiencia Provincial de Lleida on October 19, 2006, El Universo reported. The prosecutor asked for 52 years in all. Her parents, as private prosecutors, asked for the same penalties and for three more years on a charge of falsifying documents, arguing that he had lied when he applied for residence. They also reserved the right to sue the Spanish state for failing to take the necessary steps when it gave him residence.
Chamba maintained his innocence in the death of the student, El Universo reported, and said he was the victim of a conspiracy by the Mossos, according to Infobae.
The psychologist Vicente Garrido testified that Chamba had an "integrated" psychopathy, consistent with the profile of a serial offender, and a high risk of reoffending, Infobae reported. Expert witnesses described an integrated psychopathy, with no empathy for his victims, El Universo reported. In court he appeared cold, self-controlled and very sure of himself, and showed no remorse, according to Infobae.
On November 6, 2006 the Audiencia Provincial de Lleida found the charges "plenamente acreditados" (fully proven) and sentenced Chamba to 45 years. El Universo reported the breakdown: 20 years for the murder of María Isabel Bascuñana, 12 years on a second charge concerning her, and 13 years for the attempted murder of the second woman, with a further charge.
The court also ordered the company that employed him at the car park to pay 190,000 euros, and 10,000 euros to each of the victim's siblings, El Universo reported. After his release he is barred for ten years from living in Lleida or coming within 100 kilometers of the city, and from approaching or contacting her family, according to Segre. The court sent its judgment to the government's office in Lleida so that an expulsion file could be opened when the time came, under article 57 of Spain's immigration law, Segre reported.
Both Chamba and his former employer appealed. On November 5, 2007, EFE reported, in a story printed by Público, that the Tribunal Supremo had rejected Chamba's appeal and confirmed every part of his conviction and his 45-year sentence. The court accepted the appeal of the employer, a services company, and removed its civil liability. Under the Spanish criminal code, an employer is liable for an employee's crime only when the crime is committed in the course of the job and is connected to it; the court held that the only link was that the crime happened during his shift and at his workplace.
Spain's law at the time of the crime capped the time a prisoner actually serves. Segre reported in November 2024 that the court had set 25 years of effective imprisonment, that the full 45-year term would run to late November 2049, and that the revisable life sentence introduced in 2015 cannot be applied retroactively. Crónica Global, on the same day, said he would serve 20 years.
In November 2024, twenty years after the killing, Segre reported that Chamba, then 61, was held at Quatre Camins prison in La Roca del Vallès, near Barcelona, in a specialized unit. Since 2022 his individual treatment program had been marked as not accepted, because he had refused to take part in a treatment program, and as a result he was not eligible for prison leave.
His release was expected on November 29, 2029. The government's office in Lleida told EFE that the Catalan prison authorities would notify the Policía Nacional a few days before he left prison, and that the police would then open an expulsion file. "Es un procedimiento habitual en todos los casos de cumplimiento de condena de extranjeros," the office said: it is the usual procedure whenever a foreign prisoner completes a sentence. Segre noted that the Tribunal Supremo had opened the door to expulsion but that the decision rests with the government. Infobae reported in 2024 that the prospect of his return was badly received in Ecuador.
María Isabel's brother told Segre in November 2024 that the government had never apologized to the family for the residence error, and that when Chamba leaves prison he will kill again. Segre reported that investigators shared the family's fear that he would reoffend. The newspaper marked the twentieth anniversary of the killing by recalling how deeply it had affected Lleida and Spain.
Proven by final judgment in Spain: the murder of María Isabel Bascuñana, with a further charge, and the attempted murder of a second woman, with a further charge (Audiencia Provincial de Lleida, November 6, 2006; confirmed by the Tribunal Supremo, 2007).
Ecuador: the reports agree that he confessed to eight killings and was sentenced in 1993 to 16 years. The reports do not set out the counts in the Ecuadorian judgment, and the names of most of the women and girls were not given in the Ecuadorian and Spanish coverage.
Points on which reports differ:
His release in Ecuador: March 2000 (Infobae, 2024) or a date in November 2000 (Infobae, 2021); the law used is described as the 2000 remission law (Infobae) or the "2 por 1" rule (El Telégrafo).
Time served in Ecuador: about seven years (Infobae), about half the sentence (Segre) or eight years (EFE, 2024).
Arrival in Europe: Madrid on November 9, 2000 (El Telégrafo, El Universo) or Amsterdam on November 23, 2000 (Infobae, citing El Mundo).
The attack on the second woman: summer 2003 (Segre) or a complaint in October 2003 (Infobae).
Effective term in Spain: 25 years (Segre) or 20 years (Crónica Global). Two November 2024 reports, an EFE story and Crónica Global, give the year of the 45-year sentence as 2009; El Universo reported the sentence in November 2006, and Público reported its confirmation in November 2007.
Expected release: November 29, 2029 (EFE, Segre); Infobae's February 2024 account said about the end of 2031.
When her body was found: November 25, 2004 (El Universo, El Telégrafo) or the night of November 24 (Infobae, 2024).
October 5, 1963: Gilberto Antonio Chamba Jaramillo is born in Machala, Ecuador.
1988: leaves the Ecuadorian army as a corporal and buys a taxi; the first two killings take place.
1988 to 1993: eight young women and girls aged 14 to 22 are killed in and around Machala.
1993: arrested after a woman he attacked escapes and goes to the police; confesses to eight killings.
1993 (November, per Infobae): sentenced to 16 years of reclusión mayor.
July 5, 1997: moved from García Moreno prison to the Zaruma jail.
2000: released under a sentence-remission law; his criminal record is cleared.
October 23, 2000: obtains a passport and a clean record certificate (Segre).
November 9, 2000: arrives in Spain (El Telégrafo, El Universo); settles in Lleida.
October 4, 2001: legal residence granted, without his Ecuadorian record.
2003: attacks a woman in Lleida.
September 2004: starts work as a car park attendant in Lleida.
November 23, 2004: María Isabel Bascuñana, 21, is killed in Lleida.
November 25, 2004: she is found in Lleida.
December 1, 2004: Chamba is arrested by the Mossos d'Esquadra.
October 19, 2006: trial opens at the Audiencia Provincial de Lleida.
November 6, 2006: sentenced to 45 years.
November 5, 2007: EFE reports that the Tribunal Supremo has confirmed the conviction.
2022: refuses a treatment program in prison.
November 2024: held at Quatre Camins; release expected November 29, 2029, followed by an expulsion file.