La Crescent tragedy: five deaths, one survivor, and three decades of threats

At 3:00 on February 17, 1994, Fructuoso Álvarez González poured fuel onto the front of a two-story house at 1900 Baldomero Fernández Moreno, in Flores, and set it ablaze. Five people died. The sole survivor, Matías Bagnato, spent years under protection because the convicted arsonist kept threatening him.

A fire that lasted minutes

According to the case account, a neighbor saw a man leave a sports car, carry two fuel containers toward the house and attempt to pour the liquid through a ground-floor window. The flames spread through the property within minutes.

• José Bagnato, 42, a shoe manufacturer, died with his wife, Alicia Plaza, 40.
• Their sons Fernando, 14, and Alejandro, 9, also died.
• Nicolás Borda, 11, was sleeping overnight at the house for the first time.

Matías Bagnato, then 16, escaped from a room whose window lacked bars. He had closed the door connecting his room with the upstairs corridor, where the other bedrooms were located. The barrier delayed the advance of the fire long enough for him to leave.

Thirty years of intimidation

Police identified Álvarez González as the author. He was the husband of a cousin of Alicia Plaza and had demanded payment of a debt from the couple. He received a life sentence, but continued to call Matías and threaten to kill him in the same way as the rest of his family.

Álvarez González was detained again in 2011 for those intimidations. He died in 2023, at 63, without having fully served his life sentence. According to the material, the threats were never accompanied by a change in Bagnato's daily life: his grandmother Norma, who was away in Mar del Plata on the night of the crime, became his main support for decades. Both lived for years with a police escort.

“The case returns to the public agenda through a three-part documentary miniseries directed by Augusto Tejada and produced by Juan José Campanella.”Yanina Cardozo

The production includes Bagnato's own testimony, the account of the neighbor whose statement was central to the investigation and interviews with people who accompanied him through his reconstruction. The family of Nicolás Borda, the fifth victim, does not participate. The cause remains closed by the death of the convicted arsonist, while the series brings back the testimony of those who survived the tragedy.