What happened to Asunta Basterra? The real story behind ‘The Asunta Case’ on Netflix

Alfredo Balsa and his friend were out driving near Cacheiras, a town in Spain’s northwestern Galicia region, when they saw something lying next to the country road. They stopped to take a closer look - and probably hoped their eyes were deceiving them. But they weren’t: what they found was the lifeless body of a 12-year-old girl. They called emergency services to report their grim discovery.

It was 22 September 2013. In the weeks, months and years that followed, the body lying in front of these two men would be at the centre of a murder case that shocked a nation and attracted a frenzy of media scrutiny, both in Spain and around the world.

The girl was the Chinese-born Asunta Basterra Porto, who had arrived in Spain as a one-year-old. Originally named Yang Fong, she had been adopted by a married couple from Santiago de Compostela, the Galician capital: lawyer Rosario Porto Ortega, and journalist Alfonso Basterra Camporro.

What happened in the lead-up to Asunta’s death?

Asunta’s death came at the end of a tumultuous year in which her adoptive parents’ marriage had fallen apart. At the start of January 2013, Alfonso discovered that his wife had been being unfaithful to him, leading the pair to separate.

Alfonso and Rosario went through a bitter divorce that was finalised in mid-February, but in time managed to restore a ‘modus vivendi’ in their relationship. Alfonso, who now lived separately but close by, would look after both Asunta and, as his ex-wife struggled with health issues, Rosario. She suffered from flare-ups of the autoimmune disease systemic lupus erythematosus, and went through depressive episodes. In return, Rosario would help Alfonso out financially.

That July, Asunta began behaving strangely: in class at the music academy she attended in Santiago, she was sleepy and could not keep up. She told her teacher that her mother was making her take white powder that tasted terribly and left her out for the count for hours.

The following month, Asunta then spent what has been described as a happy, carefree summer holiday away from her parents, first with her godmother, then with a nanny. She returned home for the new school term in September - and was soon dead.

Toxic levels of anti-anxiety drug in Asunta’s body

On 21 September 2013, Rosario and Alfonso reported their daughter missing. When they went to the police, Rosario recalled an incident that July in which, she claimed, she had discovered a man in her home trying to strangle Asunta in her daughter’s bedroom at three in the morning. The so-called “man in black”, Rosario said, then pushed Asunta’s mother out of the way and ran out of the house. According to The Guardian’s account of the case, Rosario said she had spoken to the police at the time, but decided not to file a formal report, and did not tell her neighbours about the alleged break-in.

A day after Asunta’s disappearance was reported, Balsa discovered her body just 5km from Rosario’s family’s country house in Montouto, some 50km outside Santiago. Investigators found a toxically high dose of Lorazepam, an anti-anxiety drug, in Asunta’s blood stream. On 24 September, Rosario was arrested and formally investigated as a murder suspect. A day later, police detained and investigated Alfonso.

Where are Asunta’s parents now?

In October 2015, both parents were found guilty of Asunta’s murder, with jury members agreeing that it had been proven that the former couple had “repeatedly” and “by mutual agreement” given Lorazepam to their daughter for at least three months ahead of her death, before asphyxiating her by suffocation. Rosario and Alfonso were sentenced to 18 years each in prison.

A year later, Galicia’s supreme court ruled that it had not been proven that Alfonso had participated in suffocating Asunta, but nonetheless upheld his murder conviction.

On 18 November 2020, Rosario was found dead in her prison cell in Ávila, in the northern Spanish region of Castile-León, having hanged herself. Alfonso remains incarcerated at the Teixeiro prison, near the Galician city A Coruña.

‘The Asunta Case’: watch now on Netflix

Released on Netflix on 26 April 2024, ‘The Asunta Case’ is a Spanish-language dramatisation that chronicles Asunta Basterra Porto’s murder just over a decade ago. The six-part miniseries stars Candela Peña as Rosario Porto Ortega, Tristán Ulloa as Alfonso Basterra Camporro, and Iris Whu as Asunta.

How much does Netflix cost?

You can sign up to the streaming service’s ad-free standard plan for $15.49 a month, and to its ad-free premium plan for $22.99 a month. A standard plan with ads is also available, for $6.99 a month.