The murder of María Emilia Savigne Borjas, 38 years old, mother of three children and resident of Santiago de Cuba, at the hands of her ex-partner, raised the confirmed femicide count in Cuba to 19 so far in 2024.
Independent feminist platforms verified the incident, which took place in public on the morning of May 23 and was initially reported by the communicator Yosmany Mayeta on social media.
The gender observatories YoSíTeCreo in Cuba and Alas Tensas lamented the crime and conveyed their condolences to the three children left by Savigne, as well as other family members and loved ones.
The victim was stabbed by her ex-partner Yoel Menéndez Rivera while waiting for transportation from her workplace, accompanied by one of her children and her current partner, as reported by Mayeta on the same day of the incident.
Savigne survived the attack thanks to the intervention of several people and was admitted to the Joaquín Castillo Duany Military Hospital, where she underwent surgery. But, sadly, she passed away the following day due to the severity of the injuries.
The woman, who had a child in common with the aggressor, had already filed a complaint with the Police, apparently for previous threats she had received from Menéndez, "but the authorities did nothing about it," Mayeta stated.
The YoSíTeCreo en Cuba and Alas Tensas platforms also reported on Monday a new case for which access to the police investigation is needed.
From January to date, the underreporting carried out by OGAT and YSTCC includes three femicide attempts and a total of six cases that require access to police investigation. These cases involve the deaths of an elderly woman in Esperanza, Villa Clara; another identified as Irma and Teresa Moliner Bosa, both in Havana; Tania Reyes and Samantha (Sami) Heredia Odrens in Santiago de Cuba; and Laura Castillo Zulueta, also in the Cuban capital.
In 2023, the highest number of femicides in a year in Cuba was reported - 89 in total - according to the underreporting of cases that these organizations have been tracking since 2019.
Between both years, the observatories verified 220 femicides in the country.
Despite the increase in fatal acts of violence against women, the Cuban regime did not include the figure of femicide in the Penal Code it approved in May 2022.
Five Cubans were sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of women in 2023, as reported by officials from the Supreme Court and the Attorney General's Office on the television program "Hacemos Cuba," hosted by the regime's spokesperson Humberto López.
Last year, the Cuban judicial system also sentenced two other femicide perpetrators to 40 years in prison and more than 70% of the accused to sentences ranging from 25 to 30 years of deprivation of liberty.
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