Chilean nun Lorenza Ramirez wheels body of fellow dead nun, Erica Fernandez in a suitcase after secret pact to take care of each other beyond death.
Video has emerged of what appeared to be a nun wheeling the dead body of a fellow sister stuffed into a suitcase, sparking an initial murder investigation until police in Chile found out the incident was the carrying out of a secret pact.
Surveillance footage captures the visage of what appears to be a nun, 80, Santiago woman, Lorenza Ramirez, struggling along a street as she pulls along a bungling suitcase behind her. Inside the suitcase is the deceased body of a woman who died at the age of 58 a year earlier.
Dressed in the blue and black robes of a religious order, Ramirez walked past a home where she was recorded on their security system.
An investigation was soon launched after a horrified passer-by found the body of the deceased woman on April 8 the dailymail reported.
An initial police investigation centered on what authorities initially believed to be a drug cartel gangland style execution in Santiago.
It was only after going through local CCTV for evidence did police discover that the suitcase carrying the body of a religious woman had been abandoned by a fellow religious abiding woman.
Spanish language publication El Pais reported the suitcase containing the corpse of a fellow 58-year-old religious woman, Erica Fernandez, who had apparently died of natural causes a year ago.
Fernandez’s remains had been stored inside the luggage in a cellar from the time of her death in April 2023 ‘because of the love’ her friend had for her, Police Subprefect Juan Fonseca told the outlet.
The elder woman told police that the pair had made a pact to take care of each other beyond death.
Fonseca added that Ramirez said she and Fernandez, who was unmarried and had no children of her own, had agreed that neither of them would report the other’s death to the authorities.
Deputy Governor Juan Fonseca said the dead nun had been kept in a case as an act of ‘affection and loyalty’.
The situation only changed when the 80-year-old nun’s daughter visited and decided the woman should be laid to rest, investigators concluded.
An autopsy showed no signs of deliberate killing, police said.
Local media reports that the 80-year-old nun was not arrested but could be charged with violations of the health code.
Prosecutor Francisco Lanas was emphatic in pointing out that ‘the body was not dismembered and there are no signs of the participation of third parties. The external examination shows that there are no fractures, there are no signs of any stabbing,’ so ‘preliminarily it would be natural death.’
It later emerged that both women did not belong to a formal religious order but were ‘consecrated laywomen’ who lived a cloistered life in habits and robes.
Authorities determined that the 58 year old woman died inside her home located on Suárez Mujica Street, also in the commune of Ñuñoa.
A police investigation is ongoing.
