Caronte (2020)

After accepting his friend Edurne’s request, and encouraged by his girlfriend Natalia, Caronte leaves Gijón for a while to take on Javier Sáez’s defence in Madrid. The lawyer returns to his family home in the traditional Manzanares neighbourhood. Once there, he is confronted with his old life, and his son Guillermo, who he hasn’t seen for 10 years.

The positive development of the trial against Javier Sáez sees Caronte receive an offer from the lawyer Marta Pelayo to team up on the case of Hilario Méntrida, a father accused of having killed his daughter by drowning her in a lake. Aurelio, former colleague and a friend of Caronte’s from the precinct, lends him a hand with the investigation into the Vanessa Mentrida case.

Caronte is told the unwelcome news that Jorge López has escaped during his transfer to prison. Meanwhile, a new defendant comes knocking at Caronte’s door. Tomás is an old friend from his time inside, who has been refused several release permits and is unable to see his wife Sara or his eight-year-old step-daughter, Luna.

Caronte is attempting to recover from the blow over Tomás’ case when Marta comes to him with a new investigation. This time, a pensioner named Gloria has been accused of stabbing Bosco, the maintenance man in her block of flats. At home, Natalia looks after Kolya for a few hours and discovers Caronte’s neighbour, Irina, is a prostitute.

Natalia returns to Gijón with the hope that Caronte will soon join her, but the lawyer’s impressive performance in court has rewarded him with a new case. Jennifer is a prostitute who stands accused of killing a client in a brothel while they were engaged in sexual activity. Aurelio goes to the precinct’s warehouse and discovers the pistol which killed Jorge was seized from the Russian mafia.

Caronte’s sister Paula gets beaten up by her husband Rodrigo, who then runs off. Despite refusing to do so at first, Paula eventually reports him and Aurelio tells Caronte about what happened. Caronte moves his sister and his niece, Irene, into his home and helps them throughout the reporting process, although Paula comes up against an aggressive judge who refuses to believe her.

Marta manages to release Caronte after convincing judge Araúz that he was simply acting in his sister’s defence, although the lawyer now faces a suspension. Meanwhile, at the courthouse, Marta discovers that Cleo Torres, accused of assisting her sister who was suffering from a degenerative illness to commit suicide, has been left without a lawyer in the middle of her trial.

Julia goes to Caronte to ask him to defend Miguel, a teacher and colleague accused of murdering one of his pupils, Alicia, who he had a romantic relationship with. Caronte decides to accept the case even though Guillermo was Alicia’s friend and the young man is convinced Miguel is guilty, so he confronts Julia about it. Caronte finds evidence against Commissioner Paniagua.

After the accident and after being discharged from hospital, Caronte takes care of Natalia, worried about the baby’s health. Meanwhile, the lawyer teams up with Marta on Adeyemi’s case, a sub-Saharan immigrant accused of stealing the chalice from the village parish, something which he strongly denies. The lawyer is also concerned about the disappearance of the gun he stole from Paniagua.

Following the controversial Adeyemi case, Marta and Caronte defend some of the former’s acquaintances, Adela and Rosa, a mother and daughter accused of hiding a body in the wall of their nursery. The investigation will reveal dark secrets which even Adela herself was unaware of. After Natalia’s tragic loss, she decides to return home to Gijón to distance herself from all that’s happened.

The split with Natalia leaves Caronte at a low point. He wants to give free reign to his emotions and take revenge on Paniagua, but Aurelio stops him in time. In court, Caronte and Marta tackle a controversial case in which Ana, a poor girl, has accused a group of boys from well-off families of rape.

With Caronte fully focused on unmasking Paniagua, Marta is alone working on a case very close to home. Her ex-boyfriend Mario could end up in jail for assaulting a co-worker under the influence of drugs. At the same time, Guillermo organises a big party at Caronte’s house where a mysterious man takes Caronte’s gun.

Caronte is sent to prison, accused of murdering Toni after Paniagua had staged the whole thing to frame him. Marta gets down to work and, with Aurelio’s help, collects different pieces of evidence to convince the judge the commissioner had set it all up. Just when Caronte believed he’d lost all contact with Natalia, his ex reappears in Madrid to talk to him.