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A police report released last week by authorities in Las Vegas sheds new light on the hours leading up to and the exact moment when Yaimara Leyva-Cadet was fatally stabbed by her partner, the Cuban doctor José Emilio Galán Preval.
The document, accessed by the local outlet KTNV, reconstructs the scene from inside the home where both rented a room. There, in front of other Cuban residents, an apparently routine discussion escalated into extreme violence.
According to the testimony of the woman in the house, Galán Preval and Yaimara were in the living room when he asked her to make rice. She refused. Minutes later, the man briefly stepped away and returned with a knife. The woman reported seeing blood during the attack before screaming for help.
The son of the family confirmed that he heard the cries for help from his room. Upon entering the living room, he found Galán Preval with a knife in his hand and Yaimara severely injured. Together with his father, they managed to disarm him and tried to assist her.
Yaimara was urgently transferred to Sunrise Hospital, where she died shortly after due to multiple injuries to her face and back.
Before fleeing through the back door of the residence, the attacker left a statement that today feels like an early confession: “I am responsible for what I did,” according to the police report. He then escaped in a truck registered to the victim himself.
Hours later, the police located Galán Preval in a desert area east of Las Vegas, after receiving an emergency call in which the man expressed intentions to harm himself. He eventually surrendered without resisting.
During his interview with the detectives, Galán Preval stated that the relationship was marked by jealousy and conflict. He said that the night before, Yaimara had demanded to check his phone, convinced that he was being unfaithful.
The next morning, after sharing breakfast, the man took a knife from the kitchen and attacked her, claiming that he "lost control of his emotions."
The report also confirms that both had arrived in the United States from Cuba together and that they shared a similar immigration situation, being far from their families and support networks.
While the judicial process advances in Las Vegas and the accused remains denied bail, in Cuba, the pain remains unchanged. Family and friends of Yaimara have described her death as a wound that is impossible to heal. “She was a very beloved person, everyone loved her,” said a close friend to Telemundo Las Vegas from the island.
From the other side of the grief, a cousin of the accused also spoke about the devastating impact on both families. "The pain we feel is immeasurable. There's a deceased involved, and this was not something we expected from him," she expressed through tears, acknowledging that the suffering affects everyone.
Yaimara, according to those who knew her, was a health professional, had worked in Cuba, and dreamed of rebuilding her life away from the island. Today, her name is marked not only by the violence that took her from us but also by the void she left in two Cuban families separated by the sea and united by tragedy.
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