Man convicted of murdering U.S. tourist on pilgrimage in Spain

A jury on Wednesday found a Spanish man guilty of murdering an American tourist who was on the Camino de Santiago, an ancient pilgrimage route, in 2015.

The man, Miguel Ángel Muñoz Blas, 41, killed the tourist, Denise Thiem, while she was crossing northwestern Spain to make her way to the cathedral in Santiago de Compostela, the jury found. The prosecution is seeking 25 years in prison for the murder; a judge is to deliver the sentence within days.

Thiem disappeared on April 5, 2015 — Easter Sunday — about a month after she had arrived in Spain to walk the pilgrimage route. She was 41 and had quit her job in Phoenix the previous year to travel the world.

Five months after her disappearance, police officers arrested Muñoz Blas in the town of Grandas de Salime. Thiem’s partly buried and decomposed body was later found at his property, about 120 miles away.

Muñoz Blas initially confessed to the killing but later retracted, claiming that he had only found the body. The prosecution, however, maintained that Thiem had lost her way because of a fake marker that Muñoz Blas had placed along the Camino to confuse pilgrims and lure them toward his property.

Muñoz Blas offered no clues about his motives during the trial, which started last month.

He was also convicted Wednesday of stealing about $1,100 in cash that Thiem had been carrying.

The Camino is an ancient pilgrimage route that has been revitalized in recent years and that has become one of Spain’s main tourism attractions.