Actress Penélope Cruz gave birth to baby girl on same day as Royal baby

It wasn't only royals celebrating on Monday as a great Spanish couple, Penélope Cruz and Javier Bardem, welcomed the arrival of their second child on Monday.

The Academy Award-winning couple are celebrating a new addition to their family. Penélope Cruz gave birth to her baby daughter at Ruber International hospital in Madrid on the same day that the Duchess of Cambridge delivered her baby son.

Spanish publicist for 39-year-old Cruz, Javier Giner, said, "She's tremendously happy and very excited."

The new addition to the family is the second child of the celebrity couple. Bardem and Cruz already have a two-year-old son, named Leonardo, who was born in 2011.

As was the case when their son was born, the couple chose not to provide any more details about the newest member of their family. Naturally this low-key media experience is in stark contrast to that of the royal birth, as the UK's Duke and Duchess of Cambridge also saw the arrival of their child on Monday. 

The news comes shortly after Cruz reportedly visited her younger sister, Monica, in a Madrid hospital, where Monica also gave birth to a baby girl.

Cruz married fellow Academy Award winner Bardem in 2010, and Leonardo, their first child was born in Los Angeles in 2011.

The couple are the only Spanish actors to have won Academy Awards, both in supporting roles. The couple first met on the set of a Spanish film in 1992. However, they only actually got together as a couple after starring in Woody Allen's 2008 comedy "Vicky Cristina Barcelona", which was based, naturally, in Barcelona.

Cruz was recently heard to say: "I want my son and my kids - if I have more - to grow up in a way that is as anonymous as possible. 

"The fact that his father and I have chosen to do the work we do doesn't give anybody the right to invade our privacy."

The pair will have joint supporting roles in the movie "The Counsellor," directed by Ridley Scott and scheduled for release later in the year. The movie has a great cast including Penélope Cruz, Javier Bardem, Cameron Diaz, Michael Fassbender and Brad Pitt. 

The teaser preview is included below: 

To the source: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/355014

Spanish mother who killed daughter's rapist gets reprieve

María del Carmen García was packed and ready to head to the Fontcalent prison in Alicante on Thursday for killing her daughter's rapist. A last minute reprieve suspended her sentence while the courts consider her request for a pardon.

Back in 1998, García's daughter, Veronica, was only 13 when she was raped by a neighbor. The rapist was sentenced to nine years in prison. However, in 2005, while out of parole, the offender returned to their hometown of Benejúzar, and ran into García in the street and asked her, “How’s your daughter?”

García's response was short and to the point. She bought a bottle of gasoline, walked into a bar, poured the gasoline over the convicted rapist and set him alight. The man died from the burns he suffered a week later.

Back in 2009, the court sentenced García to nine-and-a-half years for the crime and a year later in 2010, the Supreme Court reduced the sentence to five-and-a-half years after applying the defense of temporary insanity. She was detained for one year while awaiting trial.

García was ready to head to the Fontcalent prison in Alicante on Thursday to serve her sentence for killing the man, but at the last minute, the court accepted the appeal filed by her attorney, Joaquín Galant, which called for the suspension of her sentence while the government considers her request for a pardon.

Visibly emotional after learning that, for now, she won't have to return to jail to serve the rest of her four-and-a-half year sentence, García told reporters:

“Thank you all for your support,” adding, “They have to pardon me because I’m not a killer.”

And now the court has agreed to suspend her sentence “while the application for pardon is being handled” by Justice Minister Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón.

García's daughter, Verónica, told the media, “We won a battle; what’s left is the war.”

When suspending her sentence, the court cited García’s “lack of habitual dedication to criminal activities” and noted that she had no prior record. Her lawyer also argued in court that García has to attend to her family “in particular her husband, who suffers from a serious illness.”

Her attorney said that the court had confirmed a few weeks ago that the government is currently “hearing” the petition for pardon. The petition was endorsed by more than 20 groups and 1,700 individuals.

Galant said that he is thankful for the “popular uproar” of the thousands of people who supported the pardon request. “We hope it will be approved,” he says.

The petition is still growing, as on Wednesday the family submitted a further 14,700 signatures from individuals who support García’s plea. These signatures will be added to the petition that was filed on June 11.

To the source: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/353309

British family of three found shot dead in southern Spain

A British couple and their daughter have been found dead in a rented apartment in Mijas, southern Spain. 

The family was found to have been shot dead and police are investigating the circumstances of the shooting. However, it may be a case of murder-suicide.

Local media reports (Spanish language) that the mother suffered from a physical disability and the daughter, in her 20's, had Downs Syndrome.

An official with Spain's Interior Ministry told the English media that the family had been living in a rented property in a complex in Tarifa Street, Torrenueva de Mijas near Fuengirola on the Costa del Sol for several years.

According to the London Evening Standard newspaper, the shooting could well have been a murder-suicide.

In a police report it was claimed the unnamed man may have killed his wife and his daughter before turning the gun on himself. The owner of the property alerted the police as he had not been able to contact the couple and had not received rent from them.

A Guardia Civil spokeswoman said, "The latest information we have is that the owner of the house had not heard from the family for a few days and had not been paid," she said. "He went to the house today and when there was no reply at the door, he went inside. Inside he saw the man dead on the sofa and immediately called the Guardia Civil."

"When officers inspected the house they found the wife and the daughter dead in a bedroom. The initial hypothesis at this early stage of the investigation is that this was a murder-suicide."

The British Foreign Office is aware of the reports and officials have been in close contact with local authorities in Spain.  As yet, no names have been released.

The urbanization of Torrenueva de Mijas has a close-knit British expat community and is popular for families with children.

To the source: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/353183