Opus Dei

Opus Dei is represented in the investigation chiefly through Doctor Sarasola, an influential prelate whose ecclesiastical connections bring him into the case and whose account of historical anti-Agote persecution offers one explanation for the desecrations. The later inquiry into prison psychiatric treatment makes his association with Opus Dei more troubling to Amaia Salazar, but the evidence points to suspected conduct within a network around the clinic, not a demonstrated policy of the organization as a whole.

Sarasola’s position and influence

Doctor Sarasola is described as a prominent Opus Dei member with substantial influence in Rome. He had worked there for years for Pope John Paul II and served as an adviser to the previous pope when that pope was a cardinal. He is also said to be kept regularly informed about events in the Navarra Autonomous Community. His standing helps explain why he takes an interest in what might otherwise appear to be a local case, and why his interpretation of it carries weight with those investigating.

Sarasola suggests that the church desecrations may express hatred or revenge against the Church, rooted in a misunderstood historical grievance. That account directs attention to the long persecution of the Agotes, who were kept apart in Bozate and subjected to restrictions even within Catholic worship. In Arizkun, a separate baptismal font, discarded holy water, restricted access to the altar, and a dividing grille embodied that exclusion. The historical context gives the desecrations a possible political and religious meaning; it does not establish that Opus Dei caused or endorsed them.

The desecrations and local belief

The case also turns on the mairu-beso, an infant’s bone believed to acquire magical properties when it came from a child who died unbaptized. Jonan Etxaide explains that the belief attached to the bone depended on both the child’s age and baptismal status: it was not a term for an adult arm. This folklore, together with the desecration of a church and a cemetery, sharpens the question of whether the crimes draw on local religious history, supernatural belief, or both. Opus Dei’s relevance here is through Sarasola’s proposed explanation of the church-directed hostility, rather than through any demonstrated connection to the bone or its use.

Prison therapy and the clinic

Amaia’s inquiries broaden the investigation from the desecrations to psychiatric treatment received by violent prisoners. She asks Teniente Padua to check whether the Logroño prisoner who died by suicide had received therapy, and whether Jasón Medina and Ramón Quiralte had been treated in prison. The Logroño file records contact with a psychiatrist but gives no name, only an illegible signature under the psychiatric service. In Pamplona, both Medina and Quiralte attended therapy, with the University Clinic of Navarra providing the tutor or sending someone from the clinic.

Those records lead Amaia to suspect that the clinic’s prison work might have helped identify particular patients rather than simply providing charitable care. She says she has found prison reports signed by Sarasola that list no assigned psychiatrist, describing them as ghost reports; a judge notes that institutions may have overlooked the irregularity because the documents carried the signature of a head of psychiatry. The records raise questions about accountability and oversight, but do not by themselves establish who provided the treatment or prove that Opus Dei directed it.

Amaia’s allegations and the limits of the evidence

The investigation also places Doctor Franz’s disagreement with the procedure used to transfer Rosario to the clinic under scrutiny. Amaia tells Sarasola that Franz had planned to resolve matters with him, and Iriarte points out that Franz’s recent calls could be checked. She then challenges Sarasola over whether the clinic’s prison volunteering was genuinely altruistic. Her suspicion is that Doctor Berasategui had identified Rosario as a special case and continued searching for similarly selected patients, potentially with broad latitude to do so.

Amaia frames this as a concern about a clinic-led search for violent or otherwise unusual cases, not as proof that every Opus Dei member or the organization itself participated. Sarasola’s institutional stature, the unexplained signatures, and the clinic’s access to prisoners make the association narratively consequential: religious influence, clinical authority, and prison procedure converge in a case where the available documents leave responsibility unresolved.