A wave of disturbing discoveries has left residents of São Paulo, Brazil, fearing that a homicidal maniac could be roaming the streets of the country's largest city. Over just 65 days, authorities have found 24 bodies abandoned in public spaces, many showing signs of having been subjected to the most horrific forms of t*rture. Uncensored photographs started spreading like wildfire on social media last October, showing some victims wrapped in plastic bags with their hands bound, while others were discovered dismembered. Investigators, however, have since revealed a potentially even more disturbing explanation: many of the victims may have been executed by different criminal groups operating their own clandestine justice system. This system is known in Brazil as the “Crime Tribunal.” Fabricio Oliveira/Pexels (not the real image) The first case in the current police investigation dates back to September 5, 2026. That morning, municipal street cleaners working along Rua Contos Gauchescos, in the southern São Paulo neighborhood of Jabaquara, noticed a suspicious black plastic bag. The package had been tightly secured with ropes. When authorities examined its contents, they discovered a man's body. The victim was a 55-year-old man known as José Zito da Conceição. The circumstances indicated that his body had been transported to the street and abandoned there. Fala Brasil/YouTube At the time, there was little publicly available information about José's final hours or who might have wanted him gone. Five days later, however, the discovery of two more bodies in another part of the city raised the possibility that something larger was happening. On September 10, authorities found the remains of 32-year-old Yasmin Silveira on Rua Osmano in eastern São Paulo. Similarly to José, she had been wrapped in a blanket and placed inside a plastic bag. Investigators discovered firearm wounds, including injuries to her face and head. That same day, approximately three kilometers away, another victim was found in a vacant lot on Rua Zenichi Sato. He was identified as Filipe de Carvalho, 34. Yet again, his hands had been bound, his body wrapped in a blanket and his head covered with a plastic bag. By then, investigators were already juggling the possibility of a serial criminal being the sole author of the crimes. Then, on September 13, another body appeared. 35-year-old Rodrigo Machado, was found wrapped in plastic near Avenida Eduardo Sabino de Oliveira, in São Miguel Paulista. He had reportedly disappeared on September 9. His remains were discovered in a waterway and showed signs of burning. The methods started getting more and more brutal. Fala Brasil/YouTube On September 19, residents near Rua Antônio Nascente, in the northern district of Jaçanã, contacted police after noticing a suspicious bag near a steep embankment. Inside were human remains. Police and firefighters descended the difficult terrain, using ropes to search for additional evidence. They recovered more plastic bags containing body parts, alongside clothing and a knife. The victim had been decapitated and dismembered. Identification proved difficult, as his head and hands were initially missing. Soon after, a woman arrived at the scene. She immediately recognized the remains as belonging to her missing nephew, Murilo Sanches, 26. Investigators subsequently confirmed his identity. Fala Brasil/YouTube On September 21, the body of Rafael Zimbarg, 25, was found in a wooded area near southern São Paulo. The following day, another victim was discovered along Estrada Pedreira Alvarenga, in the neighboring municipality of Diadema. On September 25, Hoeverton Luis Nascimento disappeared. Originally from the state of Paraná, he was found lifeless the following day in Vila Andrade, a neighborhood in São Paulo's southern zone. Two days later, on September 27, police investigated a particularly gruesome discovery involving human remains found at separate locations. A severed head was discovered near Avenida Guido Caloi, in Jardim São Luís, while the rest of a man's body was located approximately 21 kilometers away, in Itapecerica da Serra. That municipality also recorded a body discovered along Estrada do Tino. Fala Brasil/YouTube By the end of September, the investigation had expanded across multiple districts and neighboring cities. On September 30, the body of Lucas Reali de Paula was located near Rua Tadao Inoue, in Colônia. Reports described a victim wrapped in a blanket, with his wrists tied using electrical wires and an apparent firearm wound to the head. Then came another discovery that would bring the emerging pattern to a much wider audience. Fala Brasil/YouTube On October 2, police found the body of Célio Roberto Nascimento near a bicycle path beside the Tietê Ecological Park, in eastern São Paulo. He had been placed inside a plastic bag and his arms and legs were bound with adhesive tape. By early October, the discoveries had become a major subject of discussion on Brazilian social media. Users began sharing lists of cases, gruesome photographs of crime scenes and maps identifying the locations where victims had been found. For many, the incidents followed a recognizable pattern. Soon enough, panic took over as many posts began speculating that a serial criminal was operating across the metropolitan region and that anyone could become the next victim. Police, on the other hand, were already investigating a different explanation. On October 7, Ivalda Aleixo, director of São Paulo's Department of Homicides and Protection of Persons (DHPP), publicly rejected the suggestion that investigators had found evidence of a single perpetrator. “There is no evidence whatsoever that a serial k*ller is operating in São Paulo,” she said in a video published online. She explained that concealing bodies in plastic or fabric was, sadly, a practice already known to investigators dealing with organized crime. Aleixo also appealed to social media users to consider the effect the rumors were having on victims' relatives. “Don't turn real crimes into a horror series before there is a minimum of evidence,” she warned. “Rumors cause fear and also affect families who are still waiting for answers.” The warning, however, did nothing to change the fact that new bodies continued appearing. g1.globo On October 10, a man's body wrapped in a blanket was found along Rua Muni Stemberg, in the Tingidor neighborhood of Embu das Artes, another municipality within Greater São Paulo. Two days later, on October 12, authorities discovered Jhonata Ricardo Guedes Moreira inside a plastic bag on Rua José Pinheiro Bezerra, in Belenzinho. His body, as most others, was bound. The following day, October 13, another victim was found in a reservoir beside the Anchieta highway, in São Bernardo do Campo. On October 15, investigators recorded the discovery of Erivelton Rocha dos Santos in Jardim Reimberg. Four days later, David Gabriel Santos Coelho was found in Jardim Três Marias, in the city's eastern zone. Fala Brasil/YouTube The prime suspect became Brazil's notorious Primeiro Comando da Capital, commonly known as the PCC. Founded in 1990, it has become one of the country’s most dangerous criminal organizations. These groups are known to operate clandestine tribunals that punish people accused of violating rules imposed by criminal leaders. The alleged offenses can involve illegal substance debts, unauthorized thefts or accusations of informing police about illegal activities. Aleixo described one case in which a victim's own relatives provided investigators with a disturbing clue. Fala Brasil/YouTube “In one of the cases, for example, the family themselves came and said: ‘My uncle was taken,’” she told SBT News. The Portuguese term she used, “arrebatado,” refers to someone being seized and taken away. “The person is put inside a car. That's characteristic of a ‘tribunal do crime,’” she explained. However, investigators had not established that every victim was connected to a criminal organization. And on October 21, another discovery introduced an entirely different possible motive. g1.globo During the early hours of October 21, police officers encountered a man near the Marginal Tietê expressway in northern São Paulo. According to the police account, the man refused to obey an order to stop and opened fire. Officers returned fire, fatally wounding him. During a subsequent search of the area, investigators discovered black plastic bags scattered across a grassy area near Avenida Educador Paulo Freire. Inside were the dismembered remains of a woman. She was identified as Lucimara Garcia do Nascimento de Freitas, 35. Originally from Camanducaia, in the neighboring state of Minas Gerais, Lucimara was the mother of a one-year-old boy. Her body parts had been left at several locations approximately 20 meters apart. Police began investigating whether the man wounded during the confrontation was connected to her passing. Crucially, detectives also considered femicide as the principal hypothesis. That possibility made Lucimara's case particularly important to the investigation at large, as it meant the cruel way the crimes were being carried out were not exclusive to the criminal gangs. And the bodies kept appearing… Fala Brasil/YouTube On October 21, Jean Victor Sousa Guimarães told his aunt that he was leaving home to buy something to eat. The 22-year-old, originally from Valença in Bahia, had recently moved in with her in Cotia, a municipality west of São Paulo. He had lost his construction job in the Baixada Santista coastal region and returned to live with family. According to his aunt, Jean left at approximately 2 pm, saying he would return shortly. That was the last time his relatives heard from him. The following day, residents near Rua Paulo da Silva, in the Rio Pequeno area of western São Paulo, discovered a body in a vacant lot. It was Jean. His hands were bound, his head covered with a plastic bag, and investigators found five firearm wounds to his head. Nearby security cameras captured what happened before the discovery. Footage showed a dark vehicle stopping along the street. Four men emerged, opened the trunk and removed Jean's body. They carried him to the vacant lot, abandoned him and fled. Jean's aunt subsequently told investigators about his personal circumstances, including his previous employment and reported struggles with illegal substance use. On October 23, officers arrested a 40-year-old man suspected of involvement in Jean's homicide. g1.globo As investigators worked to identify those involved in Jean’s homicide, the broader investigation finally began producing results. On October 23, São Paulo's Public Security Secretariat announced that detectives had identified ten suspects in four different homicide cases. The investigation pointed to separate groups. Four people were suspected of participating in one incident, three in another, two in a third, and a single individual in the fourth. g1.globo Authorities requested the arrest of eight adults and the apprehension of two adolescents. “These four cases have already been solved by the DHPP,” Security Secretary Osvaldo Nico Gonçalves said. He added that detectives were continuing to identify those responsible for the remaining cases. By October 27, three suspects had been detained while seven others remained at large. _bacceymore/X Lincoln Gakiya, a prosecutor specializing in organized crime and the PCC, suggested that leaving bodies in public could serve as a warning to rivals or other members of criminal organizations. In his view, the practice is specifically designed to make the bodies easy to find. In other words, the social media panic that ensued worked in the PCCs favor. Security specialist Rafael Alcadipani, a professor at Fundação Getulio Vargas, agreed with the assessment, saying that it was meant to “send a signal of power.” On November 5, authorities in Itapecerica da Serra discovered a man's body inside the trunk of an abandoned vehicle on Estrada Jorge Cremm. diretodomiolo/X The car had been left in a wooded area and the victim was wrapped in a blanket. Then, on Saturday, November 7, residents discovered another victim on Rua Go Sugaya, in the Colônia neighborhood of eastern São Paulo. November 8 would bring the discovery of a decapitated victim, the body and the head being found in different places. Later that night, another body was discovered on Rua Osvaldo Alvaristo Cornélio, in Jordanópolis, also in southern São Paulo. As of this writing (November 10), São Paulo's Public Security Secretariat confirmed that authorities were investigating 24 cases of abandoned bodies recorded between September 5 and November 8. Police said every victim had been identified, although the names of some had not been publicly released. In a statement, the Public Security Secretariat emphasized that the progress made so far supported the theory of separate perpetrators. “The progress of the investigations reinforces that the cases have different perpetrators,” the agency said. “The incidents occurred across the four regions of the capital and four municipalities in the metropolitan area, with different dynamics.”
