A pregnant woman and her mother who were gunned down in Huelva are believed to have been targeted as part of a bloody feud between two rival families dating back almost two years.

The Guardia Civil is investigating whether Sunday’s horrific shooting in Isla Cristina was an act of revenge linked to the Moriña and Salazar clans.

The incident saw an innocent 16-year-old boy also shot to death in cold blood, despite having nothing to do with either of the families.

The three victims were killed when two masked gunmen opened fire from a motorbike in the El Rocio neighbourhood on Sunday night.

The victims included a 62-year-old woman, her 39-year-old daughter, who was eight months pregnant, and the teenage boy.

The pregnant woman’s 18-year-old son was also struck by the barrage of bullets but survived.

According to local newspaper El Correo, investigators believe the two murdered women and the injured 18-year-old were the intended targets.

The women were the mother and sister of a man known as ‘El Baba’, a key figure in a violent dispute stretching back to a fatal shooting in Huelva in 2024.

Murder in 2024 may hold key

Investigators are now looking closely at events almost two years ago to establish whether they provided the motive for Sunday’s bloodshed.

The feud is understood to have erupted in El Torrejon, Huelva, in September 2024.

A man named Ramon was shot dead, while his brother Luis was seriously wounded.

The suspected gunman was a local man known as ‘El Baba’, who was linked to the Moriña family.

He fled Huelva following the killing and hid with relatives more than 800km away in Gijon, Asturias.

Officers from the Policia Nacional’s specialist violent crime unit, UDEV, eventually tracked him down and arrested him. But the killing left Huelva on edge.

The following two months reportedly saw shootings, threats and fires, amid fears that the murder would provoke further revenge attacks between the families.

Now investigators are examining whether that feared retaliation ultimately arrived almost two years later in Isla Cristina.

Ex-partner spoke publicly about threats

The extraordinary background to the alleged feud became public shortly after El Baba’s arrest.

His partner Saray, her mother and her brother Luis – the man who had survived the 2024 shooting – appeared on Spanish television to discuss the violence.

They are members of the Salazar family.

Saray claimed during the Telecinco interview that the conflict had begun after she attempted to separate from El Baba.

She alleged that he had threatened her family and said she had previously been too frightened to leave the relationship because she feared what might happen to her relatives.

‘I didn’t separate before because I was afraid of them,’ she said.

She claimed she had endured threats that her brother or son could be killed if she left.

By the time of the interview, one of her brothers, Ramon, was dead.

Her other brother, Luis, appeared alongside her after surviving the same shooting, reportedly with a bullet still lodged in his head.

‘They have made our lives a misery’

Saray’s mother also spoke during the interview about the tensions between the families.

Asked how they would live alongside one another following the killing, she referred to the traditional ‘gypsy’ expectation that families separate following deadly disputes and accused the other side of continuing to seek confrontation.

She also claimed relatives were receiving threats which even mentioned children in the family.

‘They have made our lives a misery,’ she said.

Almost two years later, the same woman’s relatives are now at the centre of another devastating shooting.

Sunday’s attack left three bodies lying in the street, including that of a teenage boy who investigators believe had nothing to do with the dispute.

The precise motive has not yet been officially established and the Guardia Civil investigation remains ongoing.

But the possibility that the Isla Cristina killings represent the latest chapter in a feud stretching back to the 2024 El Torrejon murder is now a central line of inquiry.

The investigation into the earlier violence resulted in three arrests and the seizure of marijuana plants.