Margarita Landi knew this very well. Crime stories have always piqued people’s interest. From successful novels like In cold blood (1967) to new series or podcasts on true crime which today continues to flood digital platforms, the narration of crimes and events has never ceased to be fashionable. Few people know more than Margarita Landi (1918-2004), the journalist known as “the blonde with the veil and the gun” who sacrificed her personal life to work for decades on what would be her greatest passion, the story of crime. .
Also nicknamed “the lady of crime”, Landi became the first woman in Spain to specialize in the detective genre within journalism. A genre which, due to its known dangerousness, was normally entrusted to men. Being a woman can be considered a threat in the task of looking into delicate cases, although it can also have certain advantages, such as being able to investigate any case without arousing suspicion, as was the case for Landi.
“The interviewees opened up more to a woman than to a man, which made them gain importance in an entirely male world. In fact, in the editorial office there were all men except two women, her and the secretary,” Javier Velasco and Maudy Ventosa, authors of The Margarita Landi affair: the blonde with the veil and the gun (Alliance). In this book, Velasco and Ventosa find, twenty years after his death, one of the most important figures of police journalism in Spain. They do it after several years of work, bringing back their own voice and their own style, remembering their most famous cases with the irony and wit that characterized them.
In addition to being known for her dress – the black veil was due to the many funerals she attended for her professional work – she was known in the guild for her skill and speed. In fact, ironically, among his colleagues it was said that he arrived at the scene of the incident even before the crime was committed. She was also distinguished by her thoroughness: “During a murder, she spoke with both the victim’s family and the murderer, she treated both parties equally and documented the whole environment,” say Velasco and Ventosa.
To benefit from her work, she maintained a close relationship with the police, essential in the development of her professional work, which earned her another nickname “Sub-Inspector Pedrito”. A nickname, or rather a pseudonym, which allowed her to be immediately alerted by the police without arousing suspicion and to appear on the scene in her emblematic Volkswagen Karmann Ghia sports car.
“Margarita has all the qualities to make you wonder why Netflix hasn’t already done something with her life?” Blood red. Event press in Spain (Editorial La Felguera), a book that includes an x-ray of the chronicle of events in the country, also recently published. His life was not easy. Orphaned since she was little, she lived through the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera, the Republic, a civil war, another dictatorship, the Transition and democracy. Constant political and social changes to which he also had to adapt in his way of writing and producing his work. His chronicles must be understood in each context in which they were written.
Under the dictatorship, for example, all information was controlled and we wanted to give an idyllic image of the country, without deaths or crimes. In fact, during the Franco period and especially at the beginning, the popular weekly El Caso, of which Landi was a part for more than three decades, was only allowed to publish one murder per week. A way of censoring the social reality of the country based on a genre of particular importance that Landi described as “journalism with a capital letter”. In fact, anecdotally, Javier Velasco and Maudy Ventosa say that in their documentation work they found censorship such as changing the phrase “we found the body half naked” to “half dressed.” Once again, an attempt to soften and show an idyllic version very far from the social reality of the country.
This blonde with the veil and the pistol quickly made a name for herself in the world of crime journalism. A revolutionary woman known for wearing pants, driving a sports car or smoking a pipe could not go unnoticed. He spent 35 years at El Caso, one of the most popular newspapers of the 60s and 70s, also going through difficult times due to the social changes the country was experiencing. Then the journalist went through Interviú and on RTVE, in event programs like La palmara, Code one or Así son las cosas. In fact, he even presented his own program, My Favorite Crimes on Telemadrid. An era that ended up popularizing the figure of Landi in Spanish society thanks to his sophisticated and particular image, perfect for cinema.
Landi was one of the great figures who participated in the history of events and blood, but not the only one. Around each event there was and is a morbidity oriented, not only to know the complete story, but also the ins and outs behind it, as if it were a fictional detective novel . The news press in Spain, or “red press”, has always been on everyone’s lips, in part because of the number of newspapers and weeklies devoted to its distribution and reporting.
The first event that can be described as a media event in Spain was the one known as the “crime of Fuencarral Street” (1888), a murder in a house on this famous street in Madrid in which a body in fire was found. This is what Servando Rocha, writer and editor-in-chief of La Felguera, tells elDiario.es: “This crime, which was followed for days by the press, was the first news that made it known that the crime and morbidity sell.”
Events (1866-1869) was the first specialized newspaper in Spain, a tabloid that brought together, also with illustrations, some of the most remarkable catastrophes or accidents of the moment. A true revolution in the Spanish press and society which has awakened and normalized this bloody story through daily episodes. It should be noted that in the beginning, “events” meant any type of event. It was only later that this word acquired its current meaning. Furthermore, being a crime reporter was frowned upon, “it was around the 1920s that this started to change, they were then considered James Bond”, explains Rocha.
Dozens of newspapers followed the wake of Los Sucesos after its disappearance, but one will stand out from the others, El Caso (1952-1997). The case It is one of the weeklies specializing in events with the longest history and greatest reception in Spain. The more than three decades during which Margarita Landi remained herself in this weekly allowed her to acquire greater notoriety before moving to television. The Case was a media outlet that, as Rocha says, “told what no one dared to say because they couldn’t do it.” A weekly that has accompanied the Spanish population in difficult social processes, while maintaining its perseverance in the work of reporting on events and crimes in the country.
To understand how El Caso followed the news, in some of its pages published in the private collection of Juan Rada, former director of the weekly, and Servando Rocha, we can see authentic and very detailed infographics. “Crime Reconstruction and Capture” is the title of a kind of plan that illustrates part of the street plan of Madrid with the outline of the path that the criminals and police would have followed in their search. An authentic immersion in the event which made this weekly a success with the Spanish press. Also striking covers that gave names and faces to murderers and murdered people.
In the words of Servando Rocha, “the La Sexta investigative team is like the case then, but with today’s media”. A legacy that would have influenced many programs, newspapers and other media because of humans’ interest in darkness. “We are fascinated to see what cannot be seen, it is like looking through a peephole at what is forbidden. “It touches the heartstrings of fear,” says Rocha.
The success of “true crime”
Everything that Margarita Landi or El Caso did for the construction of event journalism in Spain has continued in other genres since true crime modern. We now see this with the number of books, series, films or podcasts that are published around criminal stories that were not part of fiction at the time. You don’t have to go that far to remember the success of series like The Burning Body, which tells the story of the so-called “urban police crime” or The Asunta Case, about the strange disappearance and the subsequent murder of a girl in 2013. Series that embrace the legacy of chronicling events and, with current media and cases, create blockbusters that engage audiences as much as headlines did in the century last.
In Spain we gave little dignity to our “real crime”, people have now discovered that things are happening here too and that there are exciting characters, not just in England and the United States.
Servando Rocha
— Writer and editor of La Felguera
“In Spain we have little worth of our true crimepeople have now discovered that things are happening here too and that there are exciting characters, not just in England and the United States,” says Rocha. A crime story, however, that seems to have undergone big changes that are far from the story that took place decades ago. “The journalism that Landi did is no longer done. She did something else, much more personal,” emphasize Velasco and Ventosa.
The story of a complex and dark Spain which manages to describe a reality of which characters like Landi were an essential part even if we do not always remember. Not only did she break the mold of a man’s world, but she also left a legacy of a faithful x-ray of the social situation in Spain for decades. A true racial journalist who, today and after the 20th anniversary of her death, deserves to be rescued. “It is important to make known Spain forgotten. Knowing our history well and bringing characters like Landi into fashion, we remember people who left a great mark in the country,” conclude Velasco and Ventosa.
