In 2015…
I traveled to Seville
and I met Manuel Blanco Vela.
One day…
I got an email
that said, "Terrible news
about a CIEE program participant."
A friend of mine wrote back. She replied to the email and said,
"Are we in danger?"
Then we found out that… she had fallen from Manuel's apartment.
They called me "Iberian meat."
I sent a friend request to Gabrielle Vega.
Gabrielle was talking about Discover Excursions
and was telling a story
that was very similar to the story I remembered.
When we got to Seville,
each group had an assigned "culture guide."
My culture guide
took us straight to a travel agency office.
This agency was called "Discover Excursions."
Their office had lots of flags from our universities.
The flag from my university, Penn State, was there.
And behind a desk
was Manuel White.
At the time, I thought he was about 40 years old.
He had dark hair and a super white smile.
He asked me where I went to school.
And I said, "I'm studying at Penn State."
And he said, "Oh, how exciting,
because I love Penn State girls."
"They're fun and know how to party."
I remember that at that moment, I felt like,
"What a weird thing to say." Because in my mind, he was like a teacher.
I thought, "Oh, okay, Discover Excursions and Manuel White
are associated with the university,
and this is where we go if we want to make another trip."
Well, I never would have imagined what was really going on.
Manuel says, "We do trips to Lagos and Morocco."
"We do everything for you."
"And we also have an activity every night."
He used to throw parties at the office.
Very informal.
Manuel Blanco is very knowledgeable
about Seville's nightlife,
or at least the student area.
Alfalfa, Cuesta del Rosario,
Betis Street, Alameda de Hércules.
He went to those places with the American students.
On the travel agency's own blog, he even had…
a schedule of nights out in Seville
that not even the most hard-partying body could handle, because it was every day.
Monday on Betis Street.
Tuesday in Alfalfa.
I want one too.
-Wednesday, soccer. -Seville!
And Thursday at the Buddha nightclub.
I felt like I had an "in." I thought, "I can go to Buddha. I don't need to pay."
A lot of girls would always repeat this same schedule every week,
because if you didn't have anything else to do, you had this plan.
Manuel Blanco came to introduce himself
as the Prince of Seville.
That hints at what his personality was like,
or what he is like.
He had a lot of power and connections.
But I also felt something else. Like this man doesn't have a soul.
His vibe was a little off.
He also organized various activities, like travel raffles.
Manuel was giving away trips at the raffle party.
They handed out pieces of paper.
And I got mine, without thinking,
because I hadn't bought a raffle ticket or anything like that.
And like a few minutes later, about an hour later or so,
someone came, looked at my ticket number and said, "You won!"
And I was like, "Well, what did I win?"
And they told me, "You won a free trip to Lagos, Portugal."
It was always the really pretty girls who won.
A guy never won.
And my parents told me they didn't think it was a good idea.
I remember that I arrived on the trip that I had won…
to Portugal, to Lagos,
and Lauren Bajorek was there.
And that was one of the last days of her life.
Gª PEÑA & ANDÚJAR ATTORNEYS AT LAW
Carey Bajorek is Lauren Bajorek's mother.
She contacted me as her lawyer
in a terrible state of mind.
One of absolute disorientation and absolute desperation.
All this, moreover, from thousands of kilometers away.
Her daughter was an only child.
She was 21 years old.
And she sent her to Spain with all the enthusiasm parents have
when they send a child abroad to learn, in this case, a language.
A few weeks later,
they call her to say her daughter has died after jumping from the 10th floor.
And without further explanation,
they give her the option to repatriate her body,
and that's the end of the story.
That's when she asked us to try to determine
the circumstances surrounding her daughter's death.
Beyond the obvious conclusions of the autopsy,
which was death due to multiple trauma.
Gabrielle Vega reports her rape by a Sevillian tour guide and businessman.
And it turns out that in 2015, two years earlier,
another young American woman had died
at the home of the same guide who had been reported.
Well, it's not a coincidence.
The police conducted an analysis
to determine whether there were any prints on the terrace wall.
It was very small, only 80 centimeters high,
which is extremely dangerous on a 10th floor.
At that height, when you get close, it only comes up to your knees.
If you lean forward even slightly, you fall.
And the wall obviously had a metal-and-wood barrier
running along the entire penthouse, except at one end
where the barrier had been removed.
That part was at the end of the penthouse, where there was a Jacuzzi without water.
And the police ruled out…
Rather, no prints were found there, which led police to rule out
that Lauren Bajorek had been sitting on the wall,
since there were no footprints or handprints.
In other words, she fell directly from inside the terrace outward.
That could be consistent with a push,
but also with an accidental fall,
given that the wall was only 80 cm high.
It's consistent with both theories.
In the transcription of the police report,
it states that Manuel says she jumped.
When you have someone who has fallen from the 10th floor,
it could be an accident,
it could be a homicide, but it could also be a suicide.
The police did a psychological autopsy
based on the WhatsApp messages the girl had sent minutes and hours earlier
to her mother and her partner in the United States.
PSYCHOLOGICAL AUTOPSY
The police ruled out suicide.
That left only two options.
Either it was an accident, or it was a homicide.
What happened in that penthouse is known only to two people who are still alive.
Those are Manuel Blanco Vela and Sarah.
Sarah gave her testimony to the police while drunk at the scene,
not even at the police station.
Right there, the officer took her statement in one paragraph.
Which who knows how closely it matches reality, if at all.
MANUEL BLANCO TOOK BOTH OF THEM
TO DRINK THE "PENULTIMATE"
PARTIALLY UNCLOTHED
THEY WENT INSIDE TO GET A GLASS OF WATER
LEAVING HER ON HER OWN
DO NOT CROSS POLICE LINE
At the time, although it seemed an accidental fall,
they do not miss the opportunity to administer a breathalyzer test
to both Manuel Blanco and Sarah.
BREATHALYZER TESTS
This was two hours or so after the accident.
RESULT
Sarah's level was 0.48, if I remember correctly.
A fairly high blood-alcohol level.
Lauren Bajorek's test showed
2.99 grams of alcohol per liter of blood.
That blood-alcohol level was close to an alcohol-induced coma.
In the words of the forensic examiner, with 2.9 grams of alcohol in the blood,
one is either dead
or unconscious.
And Manuel tested at 0.0.
0.0.
That is, he took both of them out partying.
Both of them drank,
one of them to the point of reaching an alcohol-induced coma,
and he tested at 0.0.
He was in control of the situation at all times.
I think Manuel is a predator.
He's a predator, a hunter.
I think that night he went hunting
and had the attitude predators have.
That is, a plan, a strategy, and the patience predators have.
It took him hours to end up where he wanted to end up,
and in the situation he wanted to be in, which was at 5:00 a.m.
in his penthouse, with two girls who were completely vulnerable
as a result of consuming, at the very least, alcohol.
And he tested 0.0.
Those are the facts.
One day later, I received an email
that said, "Terrible news
about a CIEE program participant."
I realized that it could have easily been me.
When I look at photos from that time,
I realize I was very vulnerable. All of us were very vulnerable.
And we didn't see that.
But Manuel did.
So when the new group of students arrived,
they all came in like, "We heard a girl died. What happened?"
And I told them,
"Don't go on a trip with Manuel White."
"Don't trust that guy."
"I don't know what happened there, but something's off."
When Carey Bajorek hires us for this case,
the criminal side of the case had already been dismissed.
The investigating judge in Seville,
without carrying out any further investigative steps,
closed the case
saying that there was not enough evidence to continue the investigation.
But in my opinion, it was absolutely premature and unjustified.
There were no grounds to rule out anything.
Without further eyewitness testimony, the proceedings were closed.
Hours later, she was flown back to the US.
And that also caught our attention.
SARAH LEFT THE COUNTRY AFTER THE EVENTS, MAKING AN EXTENSIVE INTERVIEW IMPOSSIBLE
We explained to her that the criminal route was closed
and that there was no way to reopen it.
But there was a possibility of civil proceedings.
COURTHOUSE
And that is what she hired us to do.
It's what we did, and that's the case we took to court in Seville.
A few days before the trial took place,
Lauren's mother, Carey Bajorek, told me she was dying,
and that she would hold on until the trial was over
and we had a ruling.
And that's what happened. The judge upheld our claim and ruled in our favor.
He found that there had been liability for negligence
on Manuel's part,
and set compensation at just over 70,000 euros.
I informed her of the ruling, and a few days later she died.
She felt relieved in the sense of at least knowing part of what happened.
But of course, a ruling couldn't give her what she truly wanted.
Do you swear to tell the truth?
As defendant,
you have the right not to plead guilty, not to testify against yourself,
or not to testify at all.
Any words for the victims?
Hey, don't touch me.
I'm just talking to you.
If they don't know each other, how do all their statements match?
I had nothing to do with it.
I had no relationship with that person during that trip.
I didn't do anything. with that person during that trip.