Palermo Division, is it based on a true story?

“Characters and events depicted in this story are completely fictional. Any resemblance to actual people, living or dead, or to actual events is purely coincidental,” reads the caption at the start of a fictional piece and that single precision has a This sentence that resonates with all of us, with one or more variations in its text, has a purpose: it is a warning from studios, screenwriters and producers of any complaints that their films may raise from the part of people who feel affected or defamed by what is related there.

But this first alert leads to triggering another alert, is this then a real fact? And it seems that in Department of Palermo at least there is something of that. However, for the time being, national production, which has been a resounding success in netflix He could have been inspired by a city guard that actually existed, although with other characteristics.

The series, which consists of eight chapters of about half an hour each and remains in the ranking of the most watched series on the platform, was written, directed and performed Santiago Korovsky for the streaming giant. Already from the trailer much of what is to come is told. The security forces must clean up their image and create a special inclusive division, to make life more pleasant for the neighbor, but above all as a marketing strategy to earn points with their superiors and clean up past bad deeds.

Starting from this postulate, the direction of the police goes in search of candidates: “we must add minorities”. And so they embark on a very particular cast, falling into all the commonplaces of prejudice: a young blind man, a trans girl, a short man, a foreigner, a woman in a wheelchair, among others. But something spirals out of control with a criminal gang on their first day of operation as they try to figure out what function they serve, and it will all revolve around this police incident.

Was there really an urban guard in our country?

In the autonomous city of Buenos Aires, between 2006 and 2008, a security force made up of civilians worked in coordination with the Argentine Federal Police and other organizations, such as the fire brigade, civil defense and the medical care service of (SAME) to strengthen security policy and reduce urban conflict rates.

The Buenos Aires Urban Guard, which numbered nearly a thousand members, was framed in the crime prevention plan of the government of Buenos Aires de Hannibal Ibarra and it was disbanded years later, when its successor Mauricio Macri decreed its dissolution considering that it did not make sense to maintain it because many of its functions fell under other sectors of government.

This group did not replace the police, but rather supplemented and supported their work. It was created in order to be more in contact with neighbors and to provide assistance, from the prevention of altercations, accidents or crimes, to orientation, to accompanying a person to cross the street or take a break when leaving school. Subsequently, they were given the power to issue verification certificates and control traffic. They could stop a vehicle if the driver was not wearing a seatbelt or if someone on a motorcycle was not wearing a helmet.

This city guard recruited civilians with a vocation of service but it was not suitable for everyone, rather they had to meet certain requirements (different from those of the series, of course). Some of them were: being between 21 and 35 years old; have completed high school without having served in another agency; not be disqualified from holding public office and not be in the middle of legal proceedings.

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