A WOMAN whose neighbour asked her to store a box of “sex toys” later discovered a decapitated human head decomposing inside it.

The shocked Spanish woman reportedly suffered a panic attack after seeing the macabre contents, as she only recently removed the box from a wardrobe after noticing a stench.

3 Police check the flat of Maria del Carmen Merino in Cantabria, Spain Credit: Alamy Live News

3 Jesus Maria Baranda, pictured with his partner Maria del Carmen Merino Credit: CEN

The severed head appeared to have been boiled in water and wrapped in foil, possibly to limit odour escaping, reports Antenna Public Mirror 3.

Police in northern Spain arrested the original owner of the box, Maria del Carmen Merino, 61, in Castro Urdiales, Cantabria.

They allege that the severed head belonged to Jesus Maria Baranda, 67, her partner of seven years.

A former bank worker, he had been retired since 2018, and was divorced with children.

His body is still missing.

Local media reported that Merino had given the box to her friend, who lives near her, to store at her apartment in April.

Bizarrely, she allegedly told her it was full of her sex toys, which her boyfriend had left when he moved out.

HEAD A "MEMENTO"

However, the unnamed neighbour only recently opened the box after she noticed a pungent odour wafting from the wardrobe, where it had been stored for six months, reports add.

After Merino was arrested she told cops someone had dumped the box outside her front door, and that she had initially "kept it because it was the only memento I had of him".

The victim went missing in February, but his family did not report his disappearance until March, according to local media.

Both Baranda's brother and Merino alerted the Spanish Civil Guard.

She was said to have told officers that her boyfriend had left cash for her after leaving suddenly, with no prior warning.

At first, police assumed he'd left voluntarily, until they discovered his bank accounts were untouched, and Baranda had not taken his car with him.

MERINO "GRUMPY"

When investigators told Merino they were heading to her house on April 10, to investigate her apartment, she allegedly wrapped her partner's severed head and put it in a box covered in wrapping paper.

She then allegedly went to her friend's house and gave her the box to store, telling her it was full of sex toys that Baranda had left behind.

Her pal put the box inside a wardrobe in her guest bedroom before removing it because of the stench.

Merino was described as a "grumpy person who did not like children around her", according to neighbours who also live in the same apartment block, according to The Times.

When questioned on Baranda's whereabouts, Merino told the Spanish Civil Guard that she had contacted her partner through WhatsApp.

But, when officers asked her for her mobile phone, she said it had fallen in the loo before claiming that Baranda "is gone because he did not love me anymore".

La Vanguardia says the Criminal Guard unit of the Civil Guard is now conducting tests to see whether the head had been treated with chemicals.

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After being detained, Merino is facing homicide charges, reports El Pais, which adds that officials have been searching land belonging to the dead man.

One of his cousins, Carlos Ricondo, told the publication: "We had hopes that he would return, but after so long, without any signs of life, we even thought that he might have thrown himself into the sea."

The neighbours she gave the box to reportedly do not want to return to their house because of their grim discovery.