Dr. Mata

The blood facts that surround the case of “Doctor Mata” between 1945 and 1948 are closely related to the events that were occurring at the moment, especially with the movement of lawyer and leader Jorge Eliecer Gaitán, who is shaping into the future president of Colombia. Doctor Mata has some effect on the election results of ’46, the March of Silence, and the murder of the leader, caused the El Bogotazo.

A close friend of Matallana and Orozco, judge Alvarado is a typical representative of Bogota’s aristocratic intellectuality of the 40’s; expert in verses, cultivating philosophy, literature, law, history, and political theories. When it comes to treating other that aren’t his same social class, he will always be arrogant and cold. He will avoid the confrontation, but, if it’s the case, he won’t doubt using sarcasm with the most amount of venom possible. His favorite victim will be Matallana, but Alvarado won’t come out unpunished.

A posh lady from Boyaca’s providence, she is the “legitimate” Mrs. Matallana. At 80 years old, she is retired from social life and lives in Soacha, waiting for news of her beloved husband, whom she considers a paragon of virtues. Bertha is a species of love that is essential in Mata’s life; a synonym of purity, relaxation, and peace. Stripped of his vanity and pretentiousness, Matallana feels fully connected with her good and simple side.

Mentor and close friend of Capote’s, the old detective Pablo Cespedes incarnates excess, bad habits, and dramas of the police that he has lived in the streets for many years. Cespedes has taken refuge in drinking to stand his reality. He has practically lost all contact with his family, and his only support is Capote, his novice colleague whom he ends up considering, though he never said it, his only family.

Elias is Lilia Mendoza’s last son with the missing musician Eladio Mendoza. Elias is a talented musician; at 13 he plays the bandola as a master and earns a living by selling hen and potato on the street as he also takes bandola classes paid for by Nepomuceno Matallana, his first and most devoted fan.

Alfredo Ferro is one of Doctor Matallana’s clients and close friends. He has the perfect profile to be one of his victims: he is a prosperous businessman, owns land and commercial spaces in Bogota’s downtown area, and prosperous business at La Perseverancia’s plaza. When he becomes a pariah to society because of his relationship with the scandalous Mercedes Ramos, lawyer Matallana is in charge of “sending” him on a trip, thinking that no one is going to miss him. What Mata doesn’t know is that old Ferro built more than a relationship with Mercedes, it was a love story. Mercedes will dedicate her life to find Alfredo, even though she has to face Bogota’s most powerful people.

He is Matallana’s best friend; a confirmed bachelor with no hope who has dedicated his life to the laws and his ancient mother. He signs himself as a liberal to the service of Lopez Pumarejo and he’s a man of “principles” for whom the majesty of the law isn’t a concept, it is a way of living, the only one possible. It will be difficult to accept that he has been used and ridiculed in the worst way by Mata against Mercedes Ramos, Benito Capote, and Felix Gonzalez.

Bad spelling and great curves are her best offer for the position of doctor Matallana’s secretary. Though she has all the qualities to be a passing affair, she wouldn’t agree to an older man’s dirty games. Mata can’t resist her youth and her seduction strategies and makes her his wife. When Lucia arrives to the family, her in-law’s karma will also arrive and will be a test to dangerous Dr. Mata’s short patience.

She is Matallana’s great love, the only person in the world that really knows about his criminal life. They know of each other’s naughty and cheating ways since the times when he was a young fellow and she was an ambitious beautiful disobedient country bumpkin. Together they learned the night and hunger, drinking, and crazy love. Twenty years later they meet again, but now La Mona would like to get Matallana out of her life. She’s conscious that the man that has a prominent place in society hasn’t changed and could end up in jail because of him.

He is a crime journalist by excellence. His reputation for a diligent investigator doesn’t correspond with his small income as a journalist for El Liberal. He’s always looking for clues and details that help him clear up the abundant police facts that Bogota provides in the 40’s. When he meets Mercedes Ramos and dimensions the difficult task that she faces, he lends his ears and pen to an investigation that will uncover a modus operandi never before seen in police records.

A new detective that receives the first report of the disappearance of Alfredo Ferro, without knowing that in this case he will test his deepest convictions, tune his character, and change his life. He still doesn’t know how much he will get to love Mercedes, whom he will accompany in the task of revealing the truth about the disappearance of Ferro. Capote doesn’t sense that the strength of that love will turn him into a great detective.

No one would have noticed her if she hadn’t been walking in the arm of the wealthy merchant Alfredo Ferro Villegas, who tripled her in age and left his sad marriage to be with her. Though this relationship got everyone talking about her, she knew how to ignore the judgment to hold on to the love she feels for Alfredo. The disappearance of her “old man” will force her to dedicate her life to demonstrate that the prestigious lawyer Matallana is responsible for her disgrace.

When Mercedes Ramos accuses him for the disappearance of Alfredo Ferro, Buenaventura Nepomuceno Matallana is an untouchable patriarch from Bogota that splits his time managing the assets of their friends and representing clients in the courts.His personal confessor is the bishop himself. Who could doubt of the moral quality of illustrious Matallana? The revelations about his crimes and his condition as a fake lawyer cause a commotion in Bogota in 1948, because he is an authentic oligarch, cared for by his people, envied by his peers and admired by everyone. Matallana would never admit to a crime; he will never recognize that he faked his lawyer credentials, and much less admit the validity of the evidence presented against him. Doctor or a chatterbox, Mata is a monster created in the legal system, as he learned the rudiment of his specialty being a humble secretary of the only Tunja Cort, since then he was trained to be not a common lawyer, the best, the wittiest, and the most successful doctor in law in the 40’s.