An 80-year-old religious woman dressed as a nun wheeled a giant suitcase containing the decomposing corpse of her friend through the streets of the Chilean capital of Santiago, surveillance video shows.
The body of the 58-year-old woman was then dumped in a street in a wealthy part of town, where it was found Monday by a trash collector.
The discovery triggered a criminal investigation into what local police initially mistook for a gang-related execution, reported the Spanish-language publication El Pais.
Santiago’s Investigate Police soon uncovered the truth when they got surveillance footage that showed the suitcase with the body had been left by an elderly woman sporting a monastic-style habit.
The woman in the suitcase was identified as Erica Fernandez, who had died of natural causes following an illness about a year ago.
The 80-year-old “nun” seen in the eerie CCTV recording, Lorenza Ramirez, reportedly told the cops that she and the deceased had made a pact to take care of one another after death.
The women did not belong to a formal monastic order, but were rather “consecrated laywomen” wearing blue habits and leading cloistered lives with one of Ramirez’s three daughters.
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.
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.
Asked why Ramirez would dump her friend’s body in a street, officials said they believe she was afraid that her daughter, who had arrived from Italy to care for her, would have stumbled upon the body at her home.
“That is the only logical explanation we have so far in this ongoing investigation,” said prosecutor Francisco Lanas.
An autopsy performed on Fernandez found no obvious signs of foul play.
“There are no signs of violence or fracture on the body,” Lanas said. “She was not quartered or dismembered. There is no third party involvement. It would preliminarily be a natural death.”
Ramirez could be charged with violating the health code by concealing human remains.
