Oseney da Costa de Oliveira, 41, was arrested on Tuesday and is being held in Atalaia do Norte, the isolated river town of Phillips and Pereira they were trying to reach when they disappeared on Sunday (June 5th). Federal police said in a statement that Oliveira, known as “Dos Santos”, had been arrested “on suspicion of involvement in the case” along with his brother Amaryldo da Costa de Oliveira, the main suspect. be detained. from last week. Speaking outside the police station where the two men are being held, political police chief Alex Perez told reporters that he had been arrested at his home in Atalaia do Norte and did not resist arrest. “Witnesses placed them both at the scene of the alleged crime,” said Pereth, who was surrounded by federal police officers at gunpoint. Asked by the Guardian what specific crime the suspect had been arrested as a suspect, Perez replied: “Suposto homicídio qualificado” (“alleged aggravated murder”). Investigators suspect that Amarildo da Costa de Oliveira, known as Pelado, was responsible for the ambush on Phillips and Pereira as they traveled on the Itaquaí River on the way back from a four-day reference trip. Federal police also said they seized a set of calyxes and a paddle while executing two search warrants. Medical examiners were spotted arriving at the port of Atlaia do Norte by paddle on Tuesday afternoon as the search for Phillips and Pereira continued in a flooded forest where indigenous volunteers found several of the men’s belongings on Saturday. Pelado reportedly denied any involvement in the disappearances. A report in Brazil’s O Globo newspaper on Tuesday said that during interrogation he claimed he had not left his home in the riverside village of Sao Gabriel the day the men disappeared. The suspect admitted that he had seen Pereira’s boat on the day of his disappearance, but said that he had only left the next day, when Pelado claimed that he went hunting pigs with his own boat. Police say Pelado was seen chasing Phillips and Pereira down the river in his boat with four other people, which investigators are trying to identify.
