Manuel Octavio Bermúdez Estrada was arrested in July 2003 at Pradera, a town in the department of Valle del Cauca in southwestern Colombia, and was later sentenced for the killing of children in that region. Noticias Caracol reported that he confessed to killing 21 minors between 1999 and 2003. Other outlets, writing at different times, cite 7, 16, 23 and more than 34. Investigators in 2003 ranked him second, behind Luis Alfredo Garavito, among the most dangerous offenders against children in Colombia. He died in October 2024 after an armed attack on a prison authority vehicle on the Pan-American highway in Cauca.
The number of victims, the length of the sentence and the date of his death all remain in dispute.
Noticias RCN gave his birth date as October 15, 1961, and Vanguardia agreed on the year and named Trujillo, in Valle del Cauca, as his birthplace. The 2003 colombia.com report gave the year as 1962. It said he worked as a cook and lived in several cities, among them Pereira and Palmira. His childhood and family are not on record.
Prosecutors quoted in 2003 said his offending began in 1994 in Pereira, in the neighboring department of Risaralda, while the cases that became public in Valle del Cauca date from 1999. Vanguardia reported in 2024 that he had an earlier conviction in 1999; the court and the offense are not on record. A 2003 report mentioned a prison break in 2001 during a guerrilla attack, and a 2024 Vanguardia article said he had left a regional prison in Bolívar, Cauca, during such violence. The two accounts do not match, and the escape is unconfirmed.
Noticias Caracol's program El Rastro, which first investigated the case in 2012, dates the killings between 1999 and 2003 and places them in Valle del Cauca. The 2003 coverage on colombia.com listed the towns where investigators located the cases: Palmira, Pradera, Buga, Tuluá, Yotoco, El Cerrito and Trujillo, besides Pereira. The children were boys from poor families in the region.
The first death the reports attribute to him is that of Andrés Felipe Serna, a boy from Palmira, in March 1999. Noticias Caracol gives March 8, 1999 as the date, and the investigators of the Fiscalía's technical investigation corps, the CTI, took up the case. Colombia.com's 2003 account gives the boy's name as Andrés Felipe Serna Useche. After this case, Caracol reports, about five months passed without new reports, and on September 17, 1999 the CTI began receiving reports of further children from nearby areas.
The killings were therefore separate events spread over about four years, not a single incident. Which of them were the subject of charges in court is not on record.
The figures attached to Bermúdez vary by outlet and by year.
In July 2003, colombia.com reported that on his first day of questioning he admitted to 7 of the 17 child deaths then under investigation in Palmira and central Valle, that the figure rose to 16 the next day, and that later interrogations brought it above 34. Semana, in July 2003, reported that in a second interrogation he said he had been in contact with more than 50 children, a statement its subtitle summarized as at least 50 killed.
In 2024, Noticias Caracol, Blu Radio and Pulzo wrote of 21 children. Noticias RCN wrote of at least 17. Vanguardia wrote that investigators had examined 34 cases and that he had confessed to more than 20 deaths when he was recaptured in July 2003. El Nuevo Siglo, running an AFP text, wrote that he was convicted in the deaths of close to 34 children. The colombia.com report of October 2024 wrote that he confessed to 23 children between 1999 and 2003 and that the real number could be higher.
What is firm is this. He was convicted. He admitted in 2003 to a number of killings that the reports give as between 7 and more than 34. Colombian authorities described the true number as possibly higher. The judgment that fixed the count is not on record.
The case of a boy from the region led to the arrest. Semana dated the start of the police inquiry to Wednesday, July 16, 2003 and reported that Bermúdez was found at Pradera within hours. Noticias RCN gave July 18, 2003 as the arrest date. Which date marks the formal capture is not on record. Noticias Caracol added that information provided by a child who had got away from him gave investigators key details about the suspect.
Colombia.com reported that he was placed in preventive detention without the right to bail. The charges listed in 2003 were aggravated homicide, with other charges. The Fiscalía's CTI and prosecutors questioned him over the following days, and the changing totals above come from those sessions.
Noticias RCN reported that he confessed during the trial and that on March 20, 2004 he was sentenced to 40 years, reduced to 26 after he accepted the charges and cooperated with the authorities. Other outlets give other figures. Noticias Caracol, in its 2024 report on his death, wrote that he was first sentenced to 40 years and that the term was cut to 25 in exchange for information about the victims, while its El Rastro report gave 25 years. Colombia.com, in October 2024, gave an initial sentence of 56 years reduced to 26 through an early sentencing agreement. El Nuevo Siglo gave 40 years. RTVC Noticias said he was serving 25 years.
Noticias RCN and colombia.com tie the reductions to his acceptance of the charges and his cooperation. The court, the judge and the chamber that sentenced him are not on record. The length of the sentence is unresolved, with reported terms of 25 to 40 years and an initial figure of 56 years in one report.
Noticias Caracol said that El Rastro interviewed him at La Tramacúa, a medium and maximum security prison in Valledupar, Cesar, where he spoke on camera about the crimes. Pulzo reported that he kept newspaper clippings about Garavito in his cell and described him as an imitator. Blu Radio and El Colombiano described him as a confessed follower of Garavito. Little else about his years in prison is on record.
On Thursday, October 17, 2024, in the afternoon, armed men attacked a vehicle of the National Penitentiary and Prison Institute (INPEC) on the Pan-American highway in the Pescador sector of Cauca. RTVC Noticias and Blu Radio reported that the vehicle was carrying four prisoners from Popayán to Palmira, in Valle del Cauca. Some outlets, among them Pulzo and Vanguardia, described the route as running between Popayán and Cali.
Two INPEC officials died in the attack, and so did one prisoner who was not identified at first. Several guards were wounded; counts of the injured differ between outlets, from five to six.
Bermúdez was identified as one of the dead. Most outlets listed him among the four killed. RTVC Noticias and Noticias Caracol wrote that he was wounded in the attack and died the next day, October 18, 2024, and Caracol said he died in a hospital. The date of his death is therefore given as October 17 or 18, 2024, according to the outlet. No arrests were on record at the time; El Colombiano and Vanguardia reported an initial hypothesis, not confirmed, pointing to the Dagoberto Ramos front of a dissident faction of the former FARC. RTVC Noticias noted that authorities had not said whether guards or prisoners were the intended target.
Several points remain open. The court and the judge are not on record, and the only verdict date on record is March 20, 2004, from Noticias RCN. The sentence is reported as 25, 26, 40 or 56 years. The number of children he was convicted of killing is not on record. The earlier conviction and the reported escape mentioned in Vanguardia's 2024 article appear in that outlet alone. The statement in Semana's 2003 subtitle that he was responsible for at least 50 deaths was not repeated in later reporting and was a figure from interrogation, not a finding. The identities of the attackers in October 2024 are not on record.
1961: Born in Trujillo, Valle del Cauca (year per Noticias RCN and Vanguardia; one report says 1962).
1994: Prosecutors, quoted in 2003, place the start of his offending in Pereira.
March 8, 1999: Date given for the first death attributed to him in Valle del Cauca, that of Andrés Felipe Serna of Palmira.
September 17, 1999: The CTI begins receiving reports of further children from nearby areas.
1999 to 2003: Period of the killings, per Noticias Caracol.
July 2003: Arrested at Pradera (July 18 per Noticias RCN); questioned and confesses to a number of killings that rises across interrogations.
March 20, 2004: Sentenced, per Noticias RCN; the term is reported as 25, 26, 40 or 56 years.
October 17, 2024: Armed attack on an INPEC vehicle on the Pan-American highway in Cauca.
October 17 or 18, 2024: Death of Bermúdez, depending on the outlet.