Pablo Goncálvez was 22 years old when police took him into custody at the Brazilian border in the early hours of February 20, 1993. Within days he was held in connection with the death of a young woman from Carrasco, a residential district of Montevideo. In the weeks that followed, investigators tied him to two earlier deaths, of Andrea Castro in September 1992 and Ana Luisa Miller on the first day of that year. Uruguayan outlets have since described him as the first serial killer in the country's history.
The three killings took place in separate events across thirteen months, in Canelones department and in Montevideo. Goncálvez came from a well-off family with a diplomat father, and he had no criminal record. In 1996 a Montevideo criminal court convicted him of rape, public outrage to modesty and two homicides, and sentenced him to thirty years. The Supreme Court closed the appeals in 1997. He was released in June 2016 after about 23 years, having earned a reduction of the sentence through study and work. In the decade since, he has been jailed in Paraguay on a weapons and drugs charge and has drawn public alarm each time he has been reported back in Uruguay.
Pablo José Goncálvez Gallarreta was born on March 6, 1970, in Bilbao, Spain, where his father was posted as a Uruguayan diplomat, according to a profile published by Infobae in 2016. The family returned to Uruguay when he was nine and settled in Carrasco. The same profile describes his childhood and adolescence as ordinary, with no notable problems. His father died in July 1992, between the second and third killings.
In the proceedings that followed, the Uruguayan state described him before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights as a young man from a well-off family with no prior criminal record. El Observador reported in 2021 that he had been investigated in 1991 over a complaint that was never proven.
In 2005, while he was held in the Cárcel Central, he married a woman he had known before his conviction, and they had a daughter, Infobae reported.
Ana Luisa Miller Sichero was 26. She died in the early hours of January 1, 1992, in the Solymar area of Canelones department, just east of Montevideo.
Her death was not tied to Goncálvez until after his arrest in February 1993, when he confessed to her killing, a confession he later retracted. He was later sentenced for her death; the judgment itself, its court and its exact wording are not on record.
Andrea Gabriela Castro Pena was 15 (Infobae gave her age as 16). She liked music and dancing and kept a diary, her father said in a 2016 interview with Montevideo Portal. She died on Sunday, September 20, 1992, in Montevideo.
Her death, too, was not linked to Goncálvez until the following February. Her father, who lost his wife in 2014, has spoken often in public. Before Goncálvez's release in 2016 he said he did not seek revenge and did not want any other father to go through what he had. He also brought a civil suit against Goncálvez, which drew public criticism, and he said its purpose was to limit what Goncálvez could do with his money.
María Victoria Williams was 22, according to Montevideo Portal's 2025 article and Última Hora in 2019; a 2022 Montevideo Portal report gave her age as 21. She lived near Goncálvez in Carrasco, and she died there on February 8, 1993.
Although she was his last victim, hers was the first death for which he was charged. It was her case that broke open the other two.
The first investigators were Judge Rolando Vomero, of the court at Pando, and police commissioners Boris Torres and José Felisberto Lemos, Montevideo Portal's 2022 report on the investigation says. A neighbor's account and a description of a vehicle were early leads.
He was identified as the person the inquiry wanted, and he was arrested near 1 a.m. on February 20, 1993, at Chuy, in Rocha department, on the Brazilian border, as he came back from a trip to Brazil. He was driven about 350 kilometers to Montevideo and registered at the 14th Police Station that morning, according to the Commission's summary of the record.
The petition he later filed gives his account of the next two days, and the state's reply gives its own, and the two differ. He said that he was brought before a judge about 17 hours after the constitutional limit of 24 hours, on the afternoon of February 21, and was questioned as a sworn witness without a lawyer. A hearing with defense counsel took place on February 22, after about 55 hours in custody. The state replied that the delay was short and had been ordered by the judge, and that on February 22 he confirmed his confession before a judge, with counsel present, without complaining of ill-treatment. A forensic doctor examined him that day and found no recent signs of mistreatment, the state said. He later claimed the confession had been obtained under torture. The state said those claims were first made in 1994.
On February 22, 1993, he was ordered held in custody on charges of rape and public outrage to modesty, both described as especially aggravated, Montevideo Portal reported in 2022. Later in 1993 he was also processed for the homicide of Ana Luisa Miller, at the request of the prosecutor.
The trial judge was William Corujo. On February 9, 1996, Judgment No. 3 of the Juzgado Letrado de Primera Instancia en lo Penal de 21er Turno, in Montevideo, found him responsible and sentenced him to thirty years in penitentiary. Montevideo Portal quotes the wording of the finding as "autor de un delito de violación, de ultraje público al pudor y dos homicidios". The Commission's summary of the same judgment records a conviction for rape in a formal concurrence with the other offenses. Which two homicides the judgment covered is not on record; the Commission and the state name Andrea Castro and María Victoria Williams among the victims.
The court acknowledged "irregularidades procesales, desprolijidades formales" in the case, but found them insufficient to exclude the evidence. The state argued before the Commission that physical items and details known only to the perpetrator were enough to convict even without the confession.
The Tribunal de Apelaciones en lo Penal de 1er Turno upheld the conviction in Judgment No. 156 on August 28, 1996. The Supreme Court of Justice dismissed the cassation appeal in Ruling No. 423 on December 24, 1997; the ruling was notified to him on March 11, 1998.
On September 9, 1998, Goncálvez filed a petition on his own behalf with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. He alleged violations of personal liberty and due process, and said his conviction rested on evidence obtained unlawfully, including a confession extracted by torture. On October 13, 2004, the Commission declared the petition inadmissible (Report No. 47/04, Petition 12.064), finding that it did not state facts that would amount to a violation of the American Convention. It found his arrest claim unsubstantiated and noted that he had not brought an action of his own against the officers he accused, which it treated as a failure to exhaust domestic remedies on the torture claim.
Two outlets, El Observador in 2021 and Montevideo Portal in 2025, say he was sentenced for the Miller homicide about seven years after his arrest, and the first adds that the judge cited details only the killer could know. A 2022 Montevideo Portal report says there was no direct evidence tying him to that death and that the judge attributed it to him. The judgment's date, court and number, and the wording of the finding, are not on record. Under the Penal Code, the father of Andrea Castro said in 2016, sentences are served concurrently up to a maximum of thirty years.
From 2013 Goncálvez was held in the Campanero prison, El Observador reported. In 2016 Infobae wrote that parole had been refused to him twice and that four years had been deducted for good conduct, study and work. Later reports speak of a longer reduction.
A psychiatric report in 2012, which Andrea Castro's father cited, said he showed no signs of rehabilitation. Andrea Castro's father criticized the use of Goncálvez's family life as a factor in favor of release. The courts declared the sentence served in June 2016, applying seven years of reduction for study and work, El Observador reported in 2021. He left prison on June 23, 2016, after 23 years and 4 months.
By 2017 he had moved to Paraguay. On June 23, 2017, police at Salto del Guairá, in Canindeyú department, arrested him on weapons and drugs charges, Última Hora reported. He was sentenced to two years in prison, and Última Hora wrote in November 2019 that he had completed the sentence in August of that year; by then he had married a Paraguayan woman, and Interpol told the paper he had no pending proceedings in Paraguay.
Interior Ministry sources told El Observador in March 2024 that Goncálvez had entered Uruguay in November 2023 over the Salto Grande bridge, the crossing with Argentina. That month a woman in Montevideo reported to the Carrasco police station that a man who identified himself as Goncálvez had approached her. Police later concluded that the man was an impostor, El Observador reported in 2026. Viral audio messages in Maldonado department placed him in several places, and the Maldonado police said no complaint had reached them.
On February 12, 2026, El Observador reported that Goncálvez had settled in Maldonado department. The Maldonado police chief, Víctor Trezza, told Canal 10 that he had completed the sentence imposed by the courts, that no restriction on his movements had been set, and that police had known for more than three months he was in the department. Trezza said the presence caused no alarm and asked residents to report any irregularity at once.
The confession is disputed. Goncálvez said it was obtained under torture, the Uruguayan state said it was given before a judge with counsel present, and the Inter-American Commission declared his complaint inadmissible without finding that torture occurred. Andrea Castro's father said the United Nations had found no evidence of torture; such a finding is not on record.
How the Miller case was proved is not fully on record. A report in March 2024 attributed to a woman in Montevideo a statement by the man who approached her that the crimes had not been committed by one person alone; police later said the man was an impostor, and no court has found that anyone else took part.
March 6, 1970: born in Bilbao, Spain.
January 1, 1992: death of Ana Luisa Miller, in Solymar, Canelones.
July 1992: death of his father.
September 20, 1992: death of Andrea Castro.
February 8, 1993: death of María Victoria Williams, in Carrasco.
February 20, 1993: arrested at Chuy, Rocha department.
February 22, 1993: hearing with counsel; held in custody.
February 9, 1996: sentenced to thirty years (Judgment No. 3).
August 28, 1996: appeal court upholds the conviction.
December 24, 1997: Supreme Court dismisses cassation.
September 9, 1998: files petition with the Inter-American Commission.
October 13, 2004: Commission declares the petition inadmissible.
2005: marries in prison.
June 23, 2016: released.
June 23, 2017: arrested at Salto del Guairá, Paraguay.
August 2019: completes the Paraguayan sentence.
November 2023: enters Uruguay at the Salto Grande bridge.
March 2024: report of a man presenting himself as Goncálvez, later found to be an impostor.
February 2026: reported living in Maldonado department.