A Hiking Death Roils a Fashion Empire and the Heirs to a Fortune
[Special thanks to Joel C. Dobris (Professor of Law, UC Davis School of Law) for bringing this article to my attention.]
Isak Andic, a fashion billionaire and experienced hiker, plunged more than 300 feet to his death while trekking on this path with his son, Jonathan, almost a year ago. The two men started out early on a brisk December morning and were on their way back when Isak fell.
Mango, the Spanish retailer that Isak built into a global brand, announced its founder’s “unexpected death” in a news release the same day, calling it an accident. Police, who responded to the remote scene by helicopter, also called it a likely accident.
Questions have swirled around the incident since March when the local judge overseeing the investigation reopened the probe to give police more time to gather evidence. The mystery has deepened this month as Spanish newspapers have splashed stories on their pages, saying police are treating Jonathan as an “investigado,” or person under investigation.
In response, Catalonia’s High Court issued a statement saying the probe is still active and it hasn’t reached any conclusions. “The investigation is being handled by the police. It remains secret, and procedurally, no specific person has been or is being targeted at this time,” the court said.
The incident has put an unwelcome spotlight on one of the wealthiest families in Spain and the fast-fashion empire it controls. Isak Andic was worth some $4.5 billion in 2024, according to Forbes. He had built Mango from a single Barcelona shop in 1984 into an international retailer with more than 2,900 stores and roughly $3.8 billion in 2024 sales.
In the initial media reports, Jonathan had been described as a witness, who had been walking with his father and told police that Isak had slipped and fallen to the bottom of the gorge below.
Ruiz and other supporters of the family spoke out on Oct. 21 after the recent reports in the Spanish-language newspapers El Pais and La Vanguardia that police are exploring the possibility of a homicide. The articles also said police had not ruled out the possibility of an accidental death.
The chief of the Martorell police department, tasked with the investigation, declined to comment, citing the need to protect the continuing proceedings.
“We are witnessing a dangerous violation of fundamental rights. The right to the presumption of innocence, a cornerstone of our rule of law, has often been disregarded,” said the open letter signed by the three executors of Isak’s will—Ruiz, Creuheras and Dani López, a longtime Mango director.
For more information see Cristina Gallardo and Jenny Strasburg “A Hiking Death Roils a Fashion Empire and the Heirs to a Fortune,” The Wall Street Journal, October 25, 2025.