“I just wanted to show that killing is easy.” That was the justification given by Alfredo Galán, one of the last Spanish serial killers, to the trail of blood left by his Tokarev pistol in 2003, leaving a letter from the Spanish deck as his signature. The elapsed time is the ally of two documentaries recently released on RTVE Play, in which those in charge of the investigations analyze the cases after the cloak of secrecy that surrounded them has been lifted. The Killer of the Deck and The Theft of the Codex, which invades the niches of the Cathedral of Santiago to commemorate the famous theft of the medieval book, have recently entered the public television catalog as three-chapter documentaries.
In 2003, crime rates in Madrid were so high that the police had to set up a third homicide investigation team because the two existing ones couldn’t keep up. That was the moment when a serial killer appeared in different parts of the region. His victims were so random that even at first it was hard to tell that the same hand was behind them. The cover killer takes the viewer on a double journey; that of the police investigating the mystery of the man who left cards in his crimes; and that of tracing the journalistic newsrooms for whom the killer in the deck was their golden story.
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“For us, the journalistic part contributed an important component because the reporting influenced the killer. A letter blown by the wind happened to appear during one of his murders, and when the journalists reported this detail, he acquired it as his signature and started doing it on purpose,” explains Enric Álvarez, screenwriter of the documentary produced by Goroka. Showcasing unreleased footage of the crime scenes, the series recalls the tension in newsrooms where every cellphone message could be an indication that the killer has acted again. “It’s very interesting to show a part of us as a society that is usually explained on the event pages, but this format allows you to treat it from a distance and in a more relaxed manner,” says Álvarez.
One of the keys to the narrative revolves around the weapon used in the crimes and shows the arduous task these investigations sometimes entail. Hour after hour of recording a scenario to find a minimal part of the casings that came off after a shot and were used to identify the pistol. And it wasn’t just anyone. The documentary also does not forget about the victims, the lives that this criminal took by accident. In one of his attacks, Galán murdered some parents and orphaned a dependent daughter in a country that was not his family’s.
A Tale of Thieves
In 2011, a book made headlines and headlines. It is about the Calixtino Codex, which disappeared from the library of the Cathedral of Santiago and uncovered a whole web of strange connections within the temple and questioned the economic management of those responsible. On the day the dean filed a complaint about the kidnapping, dozens of journalists were assigned to cover the matter. “What is the Code?” many of them began to wonder.
In the end, the robbery turned out to be an excuse to carry out one of the great human vices: revenge. “Our obsession was that the story should be told in as many facets as possible. Each of the subplots, apart from the theft, which is obviously the most important one and says a lot about the cathedral and the economic management, also talks about human relationships, job insecurity within the cathedral, prisons, etc. from the vicissitudes of the investigation itself…” stresses Elena Molina, the director of El robo del Códice, a co-production between Cuarzo and the journalist Nacho Abad.
The dean at the time of the robbery, José María Díaz, observes a facsimile edition of the Calixtino Codex that was displayed in a room in Santiago Cathedral when the work had not yet been recovered.EFE
“The story was that of a theft of a film, which was tough: mysteries, an investigation with many suspects, the crime had been committed in a cathedral… But we also had something to contribute. In our case we had Remedios, the thief’s wife, and her son. We also had unreleased footage: the ambient microphones that the coroner set up at the suspect’s house to see what they were saying,” Abad points out. During the recording, the documentary’s contributors even managed to break into the garage a decade later in which the perpetrator had hidden the history book for a year. According to Abad, quite a “challenge” because it wasn’t easy for them to leave those keys behind. “We said from the start that the story was like the script for a Berlanga- The film worked and that we didn’t want to lose during the shoot,” emphasizes the director.
The story even allows for small humorous touches, such as the detail of the stormy relationship between the organist and the main voice of the choir. It even makes sense of the bond that sometimes develops between investigators and suspects, who become better acquainted with them after endless hours of surveillance.
This documentary transports the viewer into one of those many underworlds that take place in the same space and at the same time and that go unnoticed in the eyes of the majority. A book that led to the discovery of a whole parallel reality in one of the most important temples in Spain and whose protagonists rediscover in great detail a decade later.
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