Assassination of a Saint

Matt Eisenbrandt is a human-rights attorney who has devoted his career to finding legal means to prosecute war crimes. In the early 2000s, he served as the Center for Justice and Accountability's Legal Director and a member of the trial team against one of Oscar Romero's killers. He is an expert in the field of U.S. human-rights litigation and now works for the Canadian Centre for International Justice.

• PrefaceIntroductionPhotosKey FiguresMaps1 • “Informational Goulash”: Prior Investigations of the Romero Assassination2 • “In Violation of the Law of Nations”: The Romero Assassination Comes to the United States3 • “The Enemy Comes from Our People”: Coffee, Anti-Communism, and the Death Squads4 • “The Door of History”: Archbishop Romero and the Catholic Church in El Salvador5 • “A Bed to Drop Dead In”: The Search for Álvaro Saravia and the Death Squad Financiers6 • “ARENA’s Achilles’ Heel”: Our First Trip to El Salvador7 • Baby Robbers, Mad Bombers, and Other Assorted Criminals: Saravia’s Escape to Miami Brings U.S. Foreign Policy Full Circle8 • “You’re Making a Lot of Noise”: Looking for Evidence on the Death Squad Financiers9 • “You Know Better Than to Ask That”: The Search for the Getaway Driver10 • “A Rabid Anti-Communist”: Meeting Witnesses from the ARENA Party11 • “We Don’t Have a Clue What the Hell Is Going On”: The Continuing Hunt for Saravia and Insider Witnesses12 • “God Forgive Me for What I’m Going to Do”: An Insider Goes on the Record13 • “There Must Have Been a Thousand Romeros”: Final Interviews and Trial Preparation14 • “Of a Magnitude That Is Hardly Describable”: The Romero Assassination Case Goes to Trial15 • “The Fleas Always Stick to the Skinniest Dog”: The Verdict’s Impact on SaraviaEpilogueAfterword, by Benjamín CuéllarAcknowledgmentsNotesSelected BibliographyIndex

"Our Favorite Books of 2016: Part detective story, part historical reminiscence, it shows the reader how hard it is to prosecute such cases, and why so many human rights violators go unpunished." The Progressive "Fast paced, informative and dramatic... Imagine a report from Amnesty International written by Graham Greene and John LeCarre in tandem and you will have a sense of Eisenbrandt's exciting and well-written achievement." Vancouver Sun "An intriguing story filled with tragic 'if-only's' and powerful -examples of courage." Library Journal "A tale told well that provides valuable insights into the motives and modus operandi of the death squads in El Salvador, and of the financiers who commissioned and facilitated such crimes. It also highlights the difficulties that face those who pursue such cases many years after the crimes have taken place." New York Review of Books "Assassination begins like a crime thriller, complete with a criminal manhunt, before transitioning into a courtroom drama. Ultimately, however, the book's lasting value is as a work of history." America "Eisenbrandt's book is rich in depth and form ... This book is specially relevant today." FactUm "For persons familiar with El Salvador's painful modern-day history, Matt Eisenbrandt's Assassination of a Saint: The Plot to Murder Oscar Romero and the Quest to Bring His Killers to Justice connects dots, fills in holes and provides a frontline account of the battle to bring accountability to those who plotted and carried out Blessed Archbishop Oscar Romero's murder. For those who know the martyr mostly by name and reputation, the 250 pages are a primer on the man and his ministry, as well as a remarkable synthesis of the passions, politics and players at work in El Salvador's brutal last half century." National Catholic Reporter "It has taken Matt Eisenbrandt a decade to write this beautifully crafted volume, but it was well worth waiting for." The Catholic Herald "Eisenbrandt is the first to craft a detailed narrative of the plan to murder Romero and ensuing efforts to bring the perpetrators to justice." TeleSur