The Vallecas Case – Unraveling the Horror Behind Verónica.

The horror movie, Verónica, is based on a real case. But the true story is almost as terrifying as the movie.

Verónica, the movie.

On August 25, 2017, the Spanish film Veronica premiered in Madrid. The director was Paco Plaza from Spain, and among the cast, Sandra Escacena debuted as an actress in a movie. She played the main character, Veronica, so well that she would receive international recognition for her performance. She also won a few important prizes in Spain for her role.

The film reached a bigger audience when Netflix released it the year after. From that release, horror enthusiasts all over the world started appreciating the dark history. It’s a scary movie, a sure bet for anyone who likes that kind of stuff. And if you’re curious about the Ouija board and you’re interested in what can happen when things don’t go the way you expect, then Verónica is definitely for you. Rotten Tomatoes had an impressive 90% approval rate for the Spanish horror movie.

An additional disturbing fact about the movie is that it’s based on a true story…

The Vallecas Case.

The movie, Verónica, is loosely based on what is known as The Vallecas case. The reason for that name is that it took place in the neighborhood of Vallecas, situated in the suburbs of Madrid, Spain.

Estefanía Gutierrez Lázaro died in 1991 after a series of disturbing events in her family’s apartment. These hauntings were supposedly connected to an Ouija board seance a year before, which released one or more demonic entities… Possibly involving the girl’s grandfather. Some of the manifestations are documented by police in an official report after an intervention on November 27, 1992, less than a year after Estefania’s tragic death. For the movie, the director, Paco Plaza, added characters, radically changed the plot, and compressed the time perspective from over a year to only a few days. 

So much for the movie… But what was it that actually happened? What is the real story behind the famous Vallecas case?

This is the true story behind the movie, Verónica… 

On the early morning of November 27 (some claim November 19), 1992, the local police got a call from someone in the Vallecas area, a working-class neighborhood on the outskirts of Madrid, Spain. Two squad cars were immediately sent to the address, Calle Luis Marin nr. 8. The house is a 12-story block of flats, not very different from all the other blocks of flats in many of Madrid’s suburbs. 

For the six police officers, it could have seemed like just another assignment… Teenagers partying too loudly, quarrels within the family, or some other violent expression, probably from a frustrated unemployed father. 

But upon arrival, they were met by the whole family, parents as well as children outside on the street. They claimed they had been awoken in the middle of the night by strange sounds, bangings, and shadowy figures moving around inside the apartment. They were terrified and preferred to stand on the freezing street rather than face whatever was haunting their apartment.

So, Inspector José Pedro Negri summoned three of his colleagues and they went in together with the father of the family. Once inside the house, things started happening, so scary that even the experienced police officers were terrified. The doors of a cupboard that one of the policemen had closed seconds before were violently opened right in front of their eyes. The same cupboard was then seen shaking violently. Loud noises came from the completely empty balcony. At one point a crucifix was torn from its wooden frame and found on the middle of the floor. 

The Police report.

These observations are not only anecdotical but they were documented in the official report Inspector Negri wrote after the events. This file exists with stamps and all and is obviously a very strong piece of evidence. In the report, a sudden chill in the bathroom is mentioned, as well as a brown slimy substance on one of the bedside tables. 

This kind of official document is extremely rare when it comes to paranormal activity, especially from members of the police and military, who normally are not easily impressed. This makes the Vallecas case very unusual. In fact, Negri’s testimony has been scrutinized and turned upside down and inside out many times. But, the police inspector hasn’t withdrawn his statements. In numerous interviews and TV encounters, he has confirmed what happened, and he has kept his story more or less intact throughout the years. 

It should be mentioned though, that the report is just like any other police report. It doesn’t say anything about strange phenomena. It includes sober observations… For example, it confirms that the cupboard doors opened in front of their eyes, but it doesn’t mention anything that could be interpreted as supernatural. Doors can open for a multitude of reasons.

This is supposedly where it all started.

In March 1990, a day like any other, the 16-year-old Estefanía Gutierrez Lázaro made her way to school, passing the normal activity of the awakening city. This is the periphery of Madrid, and it’s not very fancy… A bakery, a supermarket, a newsstand, etc. Estefania entered the school and attended the classes of the day. 

Somewhere between morning and afternoon, for some reason, the young girl went into the bathroom with some of her friends. It was probable that the students had a gap in the schedule due to an absent teacher. Whatever the reason was, the girls decided to try to invoke a spirit with the help of a Quija board. The party had already used the Ouija before and they were all comfortable with the rules and the mechanics behind it.

One of Estefania’s friends had recently lost her boyfriend in a motorcycle accident, and she wanted to see if she could contact him in some way. Supposedly Estefania too wanted to contact somebody. Namely, her grandfather on the mother’s side, who had died just months before.

What then happened is also reasonably well documented.

The teacher Dolores Molina burst into the bathroom ripping the Ouija board from the pupils, breaking it, and then started yelling at them to return to class. At that point, the glass of the board was filled up with a strange smoke, It then exploded, and the smoke floated away to Estefania who inhaled it. The girl fainted and was led away to the nursery.

From that moment, Estefania became increasingly psychotic.

In the weeks that followed, Estefania started to show signs of mental instability. 

• She had trouble sleeping at night. 
• She suffered from hallucinations. And she heard voices, many of which came from the bathroom on the other side of her bedroom wall.
• She sometimes went catatonic for 15 minutes or more, when she laughed uncontrollably, talked incomprehensibly, or uttered only guttural sounds. 
• Her relationship with her family worsened with time, and her seizures became more frequent and more violent. 
• On one occasion Estefania and her mother were locked inside the bathroom. The door that immediately before was open, closed by itself, and the persons outside the door weren’t able to open it. When Estefania’s father was ready to kick it down, it suddenly opened by itself. Estefania’s bed was situated adjacent to the bathtub but on the other side of the wall. The family later said that the paranormal activity was focused around the bathroom, and especially around the bathtub. This is also where Estefania claimed the voices came from, on the other side of the bathroom wall. 
• On several other occasions, she attacked her siblings, without remembering anything afterward. 
• At one time she requested that her father’s family must not be informed of her imminent death. Furthermore, she said she needed a photo of herself together with her father, Maximo, inside the coffin.

Estefanias medical records.

Estefania’s parents consulted a number of specialists to try to help their daughter. But that didn’t result in any relief. None of the physicians could determine the cause of her illness. At one point, she was pre-diagnosed with Epilepsy, but her symptoms were supposedly not typical. She was treated for it, but without resolutive results. 

This is an important piece of information, though. Concepción, the mother of Estefania, had Epilepsy as well and received treatment for it long before anything strange started happening. 

The tragedy

Estefania died on July 14, 1991. She had suffered a severe seizure some days before and on the evening of July 13th, she went into a coma in her house. At around 11 pm. she was transferred to Gregorio Marañón Hospital where she died three hours later at 2 a.m. Cause of death: Pulmonary asphyxia caused by a convulsion.

After her death, not only did the family have to cope with the grief and sorrow of having lost a much-loved sister and daughter, but the strange phenomena in the apartment didn’t stop. Immediately after the funeral, there was only very light poltergeist activity. Small objects moved, and doors opened and closed. But as time went by the phenomenon increased. 

After Estefania’s tragic death, things got out of hand…

The hauntings became more frequent and more violent with time. And, according to Concepción, much of the activity was concentrated in the bathroom, and at the specific time when Estefania had gone into a coma on the evening, July the 13th. All this made it perfectly clear that the hauntings were connected to the deceased daughter. 

So, the hauntings were tied to the bathroom, the time in the evening… But also in some way to the mother of Estefania. Concepción had been complaining about the bathroom long before anything started happening with Estefania. She said she could hear a voice calling her from there, saying:

  –  Mom…

The relationship between her and her father, the grandfather of Estefania, hadn’t been good. The father had passed away of senile dementia a short time before his granddaughter. But before that, it seems like he quarreled a lot with Concepción. The two had even developed a certain dislike for each other. The family has claimed the grandfather was somehow behind at least some of the paranormal activity. 

This supposedly happened in the apartment after the death of Estefania:

• A shadow of an elderly person was seen moving in the hallway of the apartment.
• On several occasions, laughter was heard. This too seemed to be coming from an elderly person, and the family interpreted it as from Estefania’s grandfather.
• On one occasion, one of the family’s dogs was thrown several meters across the living room.
• On at least one occasion, Concepción felt a cold touch on her bare skin, on the wrist, and on the ankle.
• A glass was thrown against one of the children. 
• In all this, doors that opened and closed, things that moved, and other “normal” paranormal phenomena continued but with increasing strength.
• After some time, the family was so scared to go into the bathroom, that they always had someone accompanying them. 

The Vallecas Case – Scrutiny…

So, where does all this lead us? What can we read out from the strange and intriguing Vallecas Case, the tragic life of Estefania Guttierez Lazaro?

First of all, most of this is hearsay. We depend on what the family has to say about it. And to be absolutely clear, when referring to the family, very often the substance of the facts comes from Estefania’s mother, Concepción. She is the one in the center, almost all of the paranormal activity happens around her, or at least when she is around. As we will see further along, not all members of Estefania’s family have the same experience. But first, let’s look into what the experts have to say…

What do the medical experts say?

Estefania was on her way to being diagnosed with Epilepsy. She also received treatment for it. Her mother suffered from the same disease, and Epilepsy has a genetic factor, important or less important. I don’t know anything about the symptoms, or anything else about the disorder, so I can’t determine if Estefania’s symptoms were typical, or not. If her sudden death could have been caused by some effect of her last seizure, or not. 

This is what Mayoclinic.com has to say about Epilepsy. Symptoms may include:

• Temporary confusion
• A staring spell
• Uncontrollable jerking movements of the arms and legs
• Loss of consciousness or awareness
• Psychic symptoms such as fear, anxiety, or deja vu

It has frequently been stated that Estefania’s death couldn’t be explained. That the symptoms and her sudden and severe illness were somehow unexpected, and difficult to comprehend. But the autopsy doesn’t reveal anything strange at all… Nothing at all. Not even the physician who conducted the autopsy, Dr. Gregorio Arroyo has anything to say. Her death was a tragic complication of an Epileptic seizure. And a  number of other pathologists have examined the death certificate and come to the same conclusion.

What does the paranormal expertise say?

Concepción contacted a long row of experts in poltergeist and paranormal activity during these years. She tried in any way she could to rid herself of the curse she was convinced lived inside her house. Some of these so-called experts confirmed that there were strange things going on, while others were more skeptical. 

It is obvious that many of the supposed experts/investigators went along with her ideas just to profit from them. One seer from Seville offered to rid the house of any evil spirits for a sum of approximately $2000… About three months of pay at the time for poor Maximo. 

Another charlatan acting under the pseudonym of “Tristanbraker” convinced Concepción that it was actually her father that haunted the house. Others suggested that the spirit was much more evil and was known as  Crápula… A real demon. 

This is how tense the situation was… Tristanbraker is the gentleman on the right in the dark suit.

The last physical poltergeist phenomenon happened on All Saints’ Day of 1993.  A photograph of Estefanía was burnt. Concepción found the frame lying face down on the floor. When she turned it over, she saw that only the photographic paper was scorched. Neither the frame nor the protective glass had been damaged, nor had the surrounding objects or the floor. 

Many paranormal investigations were made, mostly by self-proclaimed mediums and with dubious methods. The only thing they seemed to have achieved was to feed the family’s fear and to influence them even more.

What do the locals, the neighbors say?

Two things are important here:

• The neighbors, and the locals around the house, at school, at the bar, etc. when asked, deny any strange supernatural occurrences. They normally blame all of the excitement firstly on the movie. Because before the film came out in 2018, nobody cared about their neighborhood. It was as forgotten as all the other millions of forgotten suburbs in big cities all over the world.

• Concepción, Estefania’s poor mother possibly wasn’t the most trustworthy testimony. She was mentally vulnerable and infiltrated with quite a lot of superstitious nonsense.

The family sold the house. But they sold it in 1998, six years after the event with the police. And they sold it for other reasons than that it was haunted, as the paranormal events diminished with time and stopped definitely in 1996. The new owners never had any experience of any paranormal activity.

Lastly – The interview in 2018.

In September 2018 the online newspaper, El Mundo, published an interview with Estefania’s two brothers, Ricardo and Maximiliano Gutiérrez. The two brothers were 16 and 10 years old in 1992. Their version of what actually happened is very different from what could be interpreted from the official tellings… And that would mean all you’ve read so far. 

Ricardo and Maximiliano were in contact with the film company before the release. The director, Paco Plaza consulted them, and they gave their approval. Even though they never liked all the attention her sister got from the film project, they still say they don’t have anything against the movie…

  –  The movie has nothing to do with the Vallecas case the way we experienced it.

About all the hauntings inside the apartment, bangings, voices, opening doors, they say that they were very young at the time. But it was their mother who was deeply involved. She truly believed that someone or something haunted them, and in that context, they too believed in what she said.

They were not allowed in the bathroom alone. Not because they were afraid, but because the mother said it was dangerous. 

They claim that Estefania was a wonderful and loving sister… Like a mother to both of them, thoughtful and caring. Furthermore, they say nothing happened immediately after the Ouija board incident. And Estefania wasn’t very interested in the occult. She had used the Ouija board a few times but as an innocent game.  Their fears started many months later, and their opinion is that their mother influenced all of them.

The Police report according to Ricardo and Maximiliano.

So, why were they all in the street, waiting for the police to arrive?

  –  Our parents had asked us to go down to the street to meet the police.  Then, when they arrived, mom began updating them on the number of supernatural phenomena they were to encounter, already in the elevator on their way up.

And all the strange things that happened during the police’s inspection?

  –  It is very curious how, just a few days ago, the chief inspector José Pedro Negri , declared in Cuarto Milenio that the doors opened and closed violently, dozens of times.

Maximiliano continues…

  –  In a TV show in 1993, he said: “The closet door was opened, I made a visual inspection of it and I did not see anything strange… “

It’s obvious that a door that opens once is very different from a door that opens and closes violently many times. It’s just not comparable. And we can’t say for certain what really happened.

And the strange noise on the balcony?

  –  That was me, Ricardo says. Mother asked me to throw something from a second adjacent balcony. She didn’t believe the officers were impressed as much as she had hoped, so she told me to go out on the other balcony and throw something. I did just that, but the stone I used hit a metal pantry and the sound was much louder than I had intended.

In the same TV program from 1993, the chief inspector stated…

  –  That noise could possibly have been produced intentionally. In fact, along with the wardrobe, that was the only phenomenon that we witnessed on-site. The rest occurred before our arrival.

The brothers have been criticized for the interview. It has been suggested that they did it for money. The two men state that no fee has been paid to make them accept to participate. 

The Vallecas case – For or Against

The story in the Police report is very convincing, even though it’s sober and rational, just like you would expect. As said earlier it is very difficult to impress officers of the police force. They tend to not accept anything that goes out of the ordinary, and they are perfectly right to do so. That is why it’s so important in this case.

There is a second report, though. Or actually a first, written before November 1992. And there are other statements from the police constables on site, but who didn’t write any reports. These are not completely in accordance with the report by Inspector Negri

Reading his text, you still don’t really get the idea that the house was full of ghosts or demons. The words are more about a series of observations. Some of which are difficult to explain.

Conclusion

In the end, the Vallecas case could very well be about the problematic situation for a family with issues in a neighborhood with issues. The two brothers also claim that practically all of the children were bullied at school. Estefania possibly because she was overweight. The fixations of their mother were amplified by unscrupulous homemade experts and charlatans. Her illness as well as Estefania’s disease escalated into a completely intolerable and destructive situation.

Even though, there are other testimonies that are in tune with the original Vallecas Case study, such as the narratives of the teacher Dolores Molina. She confirms the Ouija board, the glass, and the smoke. It is still difficult to regard the evidence presented so far as conclusive. 

Just like with so many other claims of paranormal activity, it comes down to if you believe this or that… Do you trust Chief Inspector Negri, and Concepción, or do you trust Estefania’s brothers, some of the other police officers, the physicians, and the average Joe at the bar?

Reading about and researching the Vallecas Case and the tragic death of Estefanía Gutierrez Lázaro, I still get a curious feeling. Any way you twist and turn the events, there still are things that cannot be explained easily. And maybe that is one reason why Plaza chose this story for his film over any other. This story is intriguing and occasionally it gives you the chills…

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sources

• Idealista / Lo strano caso di questa casa di Madrid che ha ispirato l’horror Veronica
• El Mundo / Dismounting Verónica, the Vallecas poltergeist who never was
• Amino / The Vallecas case
• Thrillist / Netflix’s New Horror Movie ‘Veronica’ Has a Terrifying, True Backstory
• Wikipedia / Verónica
• Quatro / Inspector Negri returns to Estefanía’s house 27 years later and remembers the nightmare