At a news conference late Wednesday, Regional Police Chief Eduardo Fondes said one of the two men arrested in connection with the couple’s disappearance had confessed to killing them. “On Tuesday he informed us of the location where the bodies were buried and promised to go with us to the spot today, so that we could confirm where the bodies had been buried,” Fontes told reporters. “Because of the confession, there is a high probability that they are, but only the (forensic) expertise can prove this,” he added. The location the suspect located was an hour and 40 minutes with the launch from the town of Atalaia do Norte and another 3.1 km walk through dense forest. The operation involved members of the army, navy and police as well as satellite imagery, drones and tracker dogs. “We will now recognize human remains with the utmost dignity,” Fontes said. “When it turns out that the remains belong to Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira, they will be handed over to the families.” Phillips’s wife, Alessandra Sampaio, welcomed the news with relief. “While we are still waiting for final confirmations, this tragic result puts an end to the anxiety of not knowing where Dom and Bruno are,” she wrote in a statement. “Now we can bring them home and say goodbye with love.” “Today, we are also beginning our struggle for justice. “I hope the inquiries exhaust all possibilities and bring definitive answers to all the relevant details as soon as possible.” Fontes said search teams plan to return to the site on Thursday to locate the men’s boat. The men were last seen traveling uphill to Atalaia do Norte, and Fontes claimed the suspects threw the boat into the river and then filled the boat with sacks of soil to sink. “We are still investigating,” he said, adding that new arrests were expected. “This was a significant step forward.” Phillips, 57, and Pereira, 41, went missing on June 5, at the end of a four-day voyage on the Itaquaí River in western Brazil. When Pereira’s friends sailed into the river and found no trace of the men or their boat, it sounded the alarm. However, the Brazilian authorities were slow to respond and the indigenous communities were well acquainted with Pereira who made the first disturbing discovery on Saturday, when they found the two men ‘s backpacks, clothes and personal belongings sunk near the river bank. Police arrested a man Wednesday, Amarildo da Costa de Oliveira, but were unable to link him to their disappearance. He reportedly denied any involvement in the disappearances. Six days later, Oseney’s brother was arrested and charged with “alleged aggravated murder”. The investigation went backwards, from the sluggish response of the army and naval search teams, to the actions of the Brazilian embassy in London, which was strongly criticized, which told the Phillips family in the United Kingdom that his body was found, only to recall the statement later. Earlier Wednesday, Boris Johnson said the British government was “deeply concerned” about the case after Theresa May called on the prime minister to make the issue a “diplomatic priority”. May raised the issue during questions from the prime minister, citing correspondence with Phillips’s niece, Dominique Davis, one of her constituents. It also comes amid widespread criticism of Brazil’s environmental policies and the estimated 235 indigenous tribes living in Brazil. Deforestation has been launched by far-right President Zaire Bolsonaro and government services dedicated to protecting the environment and indigenous communities have been undermined. Pereira was a senior figure in the state indigenous institution tasked with protecting indigenous communities, but stepped down in late 2019 after leading an operation to destroy illegal mines operating on indigenous lands. He later began working with indigenous rights organizations in remote areas of the rainforest to help map their areas and protect them from intruders by miners, loggers and drug traffickers active in the area. A crowdfunding campaign has been launched in support of the families of Dom Phillips and Bruno Pereira. Donate here in English or here in Portuguese.
