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Dr. Anisio
FERREIRA DE SOUSA
Crimes
Between 1989 and 1992 children disappeared
around the town of Altamira. The children were sexually mutilated
and murdered. De Sousa was sentenced to 77 years in prison. Two co-defendants
also received terms: Amailton Madeira Gomes (a former policeman)
was sentenced to 57 years, and Césio Brandão to 56 years in prison.
Another defendant, Valentina de Andrade, was acquitted.
The four are all appealing against their
sentences.
The victims’ families say there were 19 victims
in all — boys aged between 8 and 13 who were kidnapped, tortured
or killed in Altamira. Not all the boys cases were brought to
trial this time because of insufficient evidence.
Thursday September 11,
2003
BRASILIA, Brazil, (Reuters) – A Brazilian court
sentenced a doctor to 56 years in prison for the ritual mutilation
and killing of boys in a remote Amazon town more than a decade
ago, a prosecutor in the case said on Wednesday.
Fourteen years after the first kidnappings and
mutilations, the trial is being closely followed as a test of
Brazil’s ability to bring justice to remote areas where local
elites rule.
“This is justice for a community that put their
trust in a doctor who went on to kill their children in Satanic
rituals,” said prosecutor Clodomir Araujo.
Another doctor involved in the killings, Anisio
Ferreira de Souza, was last week sentenced to 77 years in prison
for the ritual killing of three boys and the attempted murder of
two.
Two other men were sentenced last week to a
total 92 years in jail for the murders and mutilations.
A court was set to decide the case of Valentina
de Andrade, the fifth and final defendant, on Sept. 22.
She was jailed last week after she tried to
flee the country.
Prosecutors say Andrade is the leader of a sect
known as Superior Universal Alignment that was founded in
Argentina.
A group representing the victims says Andrade
believes she was contacted by a medium who told her boys born
after 1981 were possessed by the devil.
The victims’ families say there were more
victims — 19 in all.
They were aged between 8 and 13 and were
kidnapped, tortured or killed between 1989 and 1993 in the Amazon
town of Altamira.
Some had their eyes gouged out, wrists slit and
genitals cut off.
Friday, September 5, 2003
SAO PAULO: A Brazilian court sentenced a doctor
to 77 years in prison for the ritual mutilation and killing of
young boys in a remote Amazon town over a decade ago, a prosecutor
in the case said on Thursday.
Anisio Ferreira de Souza received 57 years for
the gruesome killings of three boys and 20 more years for the
attempted murder of two other boys who escaped from their captors
after having their sexual organs removed.
Thirteen years after the first killings, the
trial is being closely followed as a test of Brazil’s ability to
bring justice to remote areas where the law may be under the
control of the local elite.
“The success of this trial shows that the
impunity of years past is over ? things in Brazil are changing,”
said Clodomir Araujo, one of the prosecutors trying the case.
Local news broadcasts showed the aged Souza
sitting hunched before judge Ronaldo Valle. As he read the
sentence, the courtroom erupted into applause.
Araujo added that the two victims who had
escaped after being mutilated were critical witnesses in the case.
Another doctor involved in the killings, Sergio
Brandao, will be sentenced on Monday. Two other men were sentenced
last week to a total 92 years in jail for the murders and
mutilations.
Earlier on Thursday, Andrade was jailed after
she tried to flee the country.
Valle ordered Andrade’s arrest after police
found she had tried to catch a flight to neighbouring Argentina on
Tuesday. She had checked in but had turned around after finding
she had to go through passport control, which is carried out by
federal police in Brazil.
Valle said this was evidence that she might
flee before her sentencing, court officials said. She was
handcuffed and escorted from the court by police in the Amazon
town of Belem and taken to a local women’s jail.
The prosecution says she is the leader of a
sect known as Superior Universal Alignment, which was founded in
Argentina.
A group representing the victims says Andrade
believes she was contacted by a medium who told her boys born
after 1981 were possessed by the devil.
A group representing the victims’ families says
there were many more victims ? 19 in total. They were aged between
8 and 13 and were tortured or killed between 1989 and 1993 in the
Amazon town of Altamira. Some had their eyes gouged out, wrists
slit and sexual organs cut off.
Sunday August 31, 2003
A court in Brazil has sentenced two men to
decades in prison for participating in the murder and ritual
mutilation of several young boys between 1989 and 1992.
A jury in Belem, 2400km northwest of Rio de
Janeiro, sentenced businessman Amailton Madeira Gomes, to 57 years
of prison for the murder of three children killed in the western
Amazon city of Altamira.
The jury also sentenced Carlos Alberto dos
Santos Lima, a former policeman, to 35 years of prison for the
killing of one of the boys and attempted homicide of two others,
the Para state justice court said on its Web site yesterday.
The lawyers of the convicted said they would
appeal the sentence, the court said.
Several boys disappeared between 1989 and 1992.
Six were found dead, with their genitals mutilated. Three more
were mutilated, but survived, and five are still listed as missing.
One of the surviving boys, now 23, said he
recognized Santos Lima as the man who raped him when he was 10,
and then took him into a forest where he was mutilated.
The defendants, who authorities said were
members of an alleged satanic group, the Superior Universal
Alignment sect, had only been charged with three murders and two
mutilations.
The sect’s leader, a 75-year-old woman named
Valentina Andrade, and two more defendants, both doctors, will be
tried separately on Tuesday, the court said.
Of the 19 victims, six died, five were never
found and the rest escaped, some after being drugged, bound and
mutilated.
Legal experts helping the victims’ families
have worked for years to bring the suspects to trial. Police
dropped many of the cases because of lack of evidence or
incompetence, according to Flavio Pachalski, a spokesman for the
families.
Saying justice could not be done in remote
Altamira, the defence pushed to move the trial to Para state
capital Belem, which was granted earlier this year. The trial
could go on for weeks.