Warning: This article contains content some readers may find distressing.
A woman in Brazil was arrested after wheeling her dead uncle into a bank to allegedly sign off on a loan, sparking outrage on social media after a graphic video of the incident surfaced.
Érika de Souza Vieira Nunes attempted to get her 68-year-old uncle to sign off on a loan for reportedly 17,000 reais (£2,600).
Video footage showed her using her hand to try and keep his head upright, while talking to him as if he was still alive.
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However, staff grew suspicious, with one clerk saying: “I don’t think he’s well. He doesn’t look well at all.”
The uncle had, in fact, passed away, having reportedly been dead for at least two hours.
As staff continued to question and film her, Nunes said to the body: “Uncle are you listening.”
She also held a pen between his fingers, attempting to sign the paperwork for the loan.
“Sign here and stop giving me a headache,” Nunes said, trying to keep his head still as it flopped.
A staff member then said: “I don’t think this is legal. He doesn’t look well. He’s very pale.”
But Nunes insisted: “He’s like that.”
In a bid to keep the act up, she then told her dead uncle that she would seek medical attention for him.
“If you’re not well, I can take you to hospital," she explained.
"Do you want to go back to the hospital again?”
However, after employees at the bank called paramedics, they confirmed that Nunes' uncle, Paulo Braga, had died hours before he had been wheeled into the building by his niece.
“She knew he was dead … he had been dead for at least two hours,” the investigating officer, Fábio Luiz Souza, told breakfast news program Bom Dia Rio on Wednesday (17 April).
Nunes was arrested at the scene, telling officers that she was Braga's niece and carer.
Lawyer Ana Carla de Souza Correa, who is representing Nunes, insisted the situation was not as described.
She told reporters: “The facts did not occur as has been narrated. Paulo was alive when he arrived at the bank."
The lawyer also claimed there were witnesses who would be able to prove this, and that ‘all of this will be cleared up', saying: “We believe in Érika’s innocence."
But police chief Souza said: “Anyone who sees that [video] can see the person was dead.”
Post-mortem results to confirm Braga's cause of death are yet to be made public.
Police are also currently investigating whether or not Nunes is actually his niece.
“I have never come across a story like this in 22 years [as a policeman],” Souza added.
Topics: True Crime, Crime
Jess Hardiman