Brazil, December 17: A Two-Year-Old Brazilian boy who had 50 needles deliberately inserted inside his neck, torso and legs, was the victim of a black magic ritual performed by his stepfather, police say.
The stepfather, Roberto Carlos Magalhaes, broke down and confessed after being arrested on Wednesday, the police chief in charge of the investigation, Helder Fernandes Santana, said.
“He did that for revenge, to get back at his wife,” Mr Santana said by telephone from the northeastern town of Ibotirama, in Bahia state. “His mistress told him to kill the child through a macabre ritual.”
The toddler, who can’t be named because of his young age, remained in intensive care in a hospital in the nearby town of Barreiras, where he was admitted on Sunday by his mother after vomiting and complaining of stomach pain.
X-rays showed about 50 metal sewing needles inside his body, including his neck, torso and legs.
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Surprised doctors who treated the boy said they knew immediately the needles had not been swallowed but inserted deliberately, one by one.
He is conscious but in a “serious” condition, hospital spokeswoman Kelly Bessa said.
“One needle perforated a lung, and he is weak. We drained the area and he is on a drip,” she said, adding that doctors were deciding today whether it would be safe to operate to remove the needles closest to vital organs.
“But that might be more dangerous than just leaving them in,” she said.
The mother of the boy, Maria Souza Santos, 38, told the newspaper A Tarde de Salvador de Bahia that she believed her son had been the victim of a black magic rite.
She said she had found a bottle of cachaca, Brazilian rum made from sugar cane, and objects used for such ceremonies in the modest house she shared with her six children, her mother and her husband of six months, Magalhaes.
Souza Santos works as a maid. Magalhaes worked as a fisherman and labourer.
Although Brazil is a largely Catholic country, superstition and animist cults exist, mainly in the poorer northern regions.
—Agencies