Three inmates, including Rafael Bueno Latorre, disappeared from Alcalá-Meco on Good Friday in 1984, escaping from a prison described as one of Europe's safest. Reports say they used no explosives or firearms, relying on careful planning and improvised pistols made from soap to fool guards. Bueno Latorre was at the centre of the operation. His seventeenth escape has never been fully explained.
More than four decades later, that disappearance remains the hardest question in the story of a bank robber who repeatedly outsmarted the institutions holding him. The documentary 17 fugas reconstructs his career through court records, press archives, testimonies and historical TVE footage digitised for the project. RTVE describes it as a reconstruction based on archival material and first-hand accounts, rather than a simple retelling of a legend.
The film avoids portraying Bueno Latorre as a romantic outlaw. Its strongest material is the damage left behind: police officers died, families grieved, prison staff worked with limited resources, and repeated failures prompted changes to the security system.
His escape from Hospital Provincial de Burgos in 1983 changed the case. Associates killed two Policía Nacional officers to free him. A prison escape became a national story.
The documentary gives the widows and daughters of those officers room to describe decades of grief. They also discuss their efforts to secure institutional recognition for the victims. Published RTVE materials identify the officers as Jesús Postigo Pérez and Raúl Santamaría.
That episode exposed a practical weakness. Hospitals were not prepared to guard inmates considered exceptionally dangerous, information from officials in the film. The problem extended beyond prison walls: custody outside the prison system had become part of the security challenge.
Bueno Latorre's record began early. He escaped from reformatories, hospitals and prisons before becoming linked to bank robberies and firearms. Former members of his group describe how he entered that world. Police and Guardia Civil officers explain why they created a specialised anti-robbery unit: existing resources were inadequate.
The period was marked by organised, violent bank robberies. Former officers recall daylight pursuits and shootings. Former inmates and bank robbers describe a man who punished people he believed had informed on him. A forensic psychiatrist who assessed him in prison offers a professional view of his personality and behaviour.
His story also intersected with the prison revolts of the Transition. Daniel Pont of COPEL recalls Bueno Latorre taking part in self-harm protests and the first major riot at Carabanchel. He did not identify with a political profile.
That detail places him within a wider prison crisis. It does not make him a political figure.
17 fugas brings together former Policía Nacional and Guardia Civil officials, prisoners, bank robbers, COPEL members and relatives of the officers killed in Burgos. Their accounts do not produce a simple portrait. The same man appeared differently to those who pursued him, those imprisoned with him and those who paid the personal price of his escapes.
The documentary also returns to a Spain that had the highest number of bank robberies in the world. In that setting, Bueno Latorre became an emblem of the bank-robber generation. His case tested the state's ability to contain increasingly organised crime.
More than 40 years after his last flight, the central mystery remains his fate. Coverage of the documentary cites an independent source saying there is still no official confirmation that Bueno Latorre is alive.
17 fugas will be broadcast on Friday 2 October on La 1 of TVE. It will also be available on RTVE Play. The film takes apart the legend of the "Rey de las fugas". The record shows a system forced to adapt as victims and families lived with the consequences long after the headlines disappeared.
