The body of a girl believed to be the daughter of a Filipino overseas worker who was allegedly murdered by a Greek Cypriot army officer has been found in Memi Lake in Xyliatos, Cyprus yesterday.
The remains of six-year-old Sierra Graze was found at the bottom of the lake. It was wrapped with a carpet and a cement block was reportedly tied to her body, reported Sky News.
Her cadaver was found after suspect Nikos Metaxas accompanied authorities to the lake and described how he disposed of the girl’s body.
Metaxas was arrested in April after he confessed to allegedly killing five adult women, including Sierra’s mother Mary Rose Tiburcio, after meeting them online, reported Reuters. He also confessed to allegedly killing the daughters of two of his victims, including Sierra.
Metaxas said that he threw Sierra’s body into the water after killing her mother, BBC News reported.
Tiburcio and Sierra were reported missing by the former’s roommate in May 2018 when they failed to return from a date with Metaxas, The Washington Post reported.
Other than Tiburcio and Sierra, two of Metaxes alleged victims were also Filipinos who were identified as Arian Palanas Lozano, Maricar Valtez Arquiola.
The three other victims were Romanian woman Livia Bunea, her daughter Elena Natalia Bunea, and Nepali woman Ashita Khadka Bista.
Sierra’s body was the last to be found. The remains of the six other victims were found at an abandoned mining site in April after tourists found a cadaver at a mine shaft in the town of Mitsero following a heavy downpour.
Before that, the killings went undetected for three years.
Because most of the victims were foreigners working as domestic workers, the case also led to a national discussion of how migrants are treated in the country, where many of them are paid very little despite working 14 hours a day.
Metaxas is believed to be Cyprus’ first serial killer.
Cyprus police are now facing heavy criticism for failing to search for the women and the children when they were first reported missing. The controversy led Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades to sack the country’s police chief Zacharias Chrysostomou in May due to the “apparent negligence and dereliction of duty of the police in investigating reports of missing persons,” reported AFP.
His termination came after Justice Minister Ionas Nicolaou resigned due to the controversy. Nicolaou’s office was responsible for overseeing the police. While he said that his resignation does not mean that he is assuming responsibility for how the police mishandled the case, Nicolaou said that there were “apparent shortcomings” with how the Cypriot police failed to investigate the disappearances.
Meanwhile, the Cypriot government promised to pay for the funeral expenses of the victims.
The Philippines’ Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said that they initially thought that the Filipinas were merely missing and were not victims of a violent crime. The DFA promised to provide assistance to the victims’ families.
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