900 Days Without Anabel, Netflix’s latest three-part true crime docuseries, will dive into the missing person case that became the longest kidnapping in the history of Spain.
Anabel Segura was just 22 when she was kidnapped by Emilio Muñoz Guadix and Candido Ortiz Añón in 1993. For nearly three years, an entire country was kept in suspense as police searched for the whereabouts of her and her kidnappers.
In the series, directed and co-written by Mónica Palomero, viewers will gain access to never-before-heard tapes recorded by police agents during their negotiations with Segura’s captors. The documentary will also highlight the months of blackmail made against her family, including the 14 phone calls made by her kidnappers between 1993 and 1995.
900 Days Without Anabel, which premieres on the streaming platform on November 22, marks the latest of Netflix’s international true crime projects, following The Asunta Case and The Man with 1000 Kids.
Who was Anabel Segura?
Anabel Segura Foles was a 22-year-old woman from La Moraleja, an affluent residential district of Alcobendas located in the Community of Madrid.
She was the eldest daughter of José Segura Nájera, a businessman in the petrochemical business, and her German mother Sigrid Foles. Segura was a business student at the ICADE university at the time of her kidnapping.
What happened to Anabel?
Segura was kidnapped on the morning of April 12, 1993, while she was on a run in her northern Madrid neighborhood. She went on a run, wearing a tracksuit and carrying her Walkman music player, when Muñoz Guadix and Ortiz Añón pulled up in a white van and held Segura at knifepoint.
She resisted, losing part of her tracksuit and her Walkman in the struggle, but was ultimately taken in the van as Muñoz Guadix and Ortiz Añón drove off.
A janitor at the nearby school was a witness to the kidnapping, but was unable to make out the license plate number on the van without his glasses. He called the police immediately after the incident.
Who were her kidnappers?
Emilio Muñoz Guadix, who worked as a delivery driver for a parcel company, had moved from Vallecas, Madrid, to the Toledo municipality of Pantoja with his wife, Felisa Garcia, and their children.
Ortiz Añón was Muñoz Guadix’s childhood friend, who had moved to Escalona, Toledo. He worked as a plumber.
Was Anabel murdered?
After being abducted from her neighborhood, Segura was held captive in an abandoned factory in Toledo, an hour away from Madrid. She unsuccessfully attempted to escape and, according to news outlet laSexta, she was killed six hours later. Her body was buried nearby the abandoned factory in Numancia de la Sagra.
However, her kidnappers pretended Segura was alive for more than two years in an attempt to extort money from her wealthy family.
What did her kidnappers demand?
Two days after Segura was kidnapped and murdered, Muñoz Guadix and Ortiz Añón made their first phone call to lawyer Rafael Escudero, who was representing her family, requesting a sum of 150 million Spanish pesetas, or $945,000.
Between April 1993 and September 1993, the kidnappers contacted Segura’s family 14 times to ask for money for Segura’s ransom. At one point, her father mortgaged his home and even offered 15 million pesetas, or $94,498, to anyone who could provide a clue to his daughter’s location.
At least twice, family representatives went to an agreed upon meeting place with the kidnappers to pay the ransom, but they never showed up.
Three months after Segura’s murder, Muñoz Guadix and Ortiz Añón sent her family a tape, in which the 22-year-old’s voice was thought to be recorded. In the audio, a woman’s voice could be heard saying she was “fine” and crying out to be taken home.
However, it was later revealed that the woman pretending to be Segura on the tape was actually Muñoz Guadix’s wife, Garcia.
For the first time in Spain, police decided to release the recording to the public, asking them for their help in identifying the people heard on the tape. Upon hearing the recording on TV, a resident of Escalona identified the voice of Ortiz Añón to police.
On September 28, 1995, police arrested Ortiz Añón and Muñoz Guadix and his wife. Segura’s body was finally found on September 30, 900 days after her disappearance, at the abandoned warehouse.
Where are Anabel’s kidnappers now?
Following their arrest, Muñoz Guadix and Ortiz Añón were sentenced by the Provincial Court of Toledo to 39 years in prison, before the Supreme Court raised their sentences to 43 years. Garcia, meanwhile, served six months in prison for covering up the kidnapping and impersonating Segura on the tape.
According to La Vanguardia, the kidnappers were charged with aggravating circumstances of treachery, illegal detention, and attempted fraud.
Ortiz Añón served the first 10 years of his sentence at the Ocaña prison in Toledo, but died in 2009 after suffering a heart attack aged 48.
Muñoz Guadix was incarcerated in the Herrera de La Mancha prison in the Ciudad Real province south of Toledo, but was released in 2013 after serving 18 years.
Upon leaving prison, Muñoz said in an interview that he was not a danger to the public and regretted his actions. Speaking to laSexta, he explained that his motive was “purely economic.”
“I made a serious mistake, which I accepted from the first moment, unlike others, and that’s it,” he said. “I am sorry, I am very sorry for what happened, I already said it in court, I would give ten years of my life so that this would not have happened.”
900 Days Without Anabel arrives Netflix on November 22.
