Spanish Police Say U.S. Woman Killed in Seville, Body Cut Up and Thrown in River

A 49-year-old American woman who lived in the southern Spanish cityhe southern Spanish city of Seville was killed

A 49-year-old American woman who lived in the southern Spanish city of Seville was killed, cut up into pieces and thrown into a river, police said Wednesday. A 30-year-old Spanish man who knew the victim has been arrested, and a police search of his apartment turned up blood stains, a National Police official said. The nature of their relationship and any possible motive for the killing were not immediately known. The woman, mother of one child, was a longtime resident of Seville and a native of New York, the official said, without specifying if that meant the city or the state. She was reported missing over the weekend.

Police divers searched under a bridge over the Guadalquivir River for two days and found a bag containing the woman's head and one of her arms and a suitcase with the rest of her body, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity in line with department rules. The police official would not confirm Spanish media reports that the suspect had confessed to police or that the victim had worked as an English teacher. The suspect had been facing a court summons for a previous, unspecified offense, the official said.