Severed head of Brazilian footballer discovered in a bag on his front doorstep

Severed head of Brazilian footballer
discovered in a bag on his front
doorstep
Police in Brazil have launched a manhunt after the
severed head of a former professional footballer
was left on the doorstep of his home. The horrified
wife of Joao Rodrigo Silva Santos, 35, made the
gruesome discovery as she left the house in Rio
de Janeiro for work early yesterday morning.
The player's eyes and tongue had been cut out
and his head placed inside one of his own
rucksacks, police said. Mr Santos retired from
football two years ago after a successful career
playing for several teams in Rio de Janeiro, as
well as for clubs in Sweden and Honduras.
He had recently set up his own business selling
health foods and dietary supplements. Continue...
Police said today that Mr Santos is believed to
have been snatched from outside the shop he had
opened in the Realengo district of Rio as he closed
up at around 7.45pm on Monday.
Witnesses said they saw several men bundling
him into his car, a Hyundai i30, and speeding off
just before midnight, a spokesman said. He was
reported missing by his wife at 9pm on Monday.
Mr Santos' brother-in-law, who didn't want to be
named, told Brazil's Globo G1 website that the
player's wife, Geisa Silva, 31, stayed up all night
after her husband failed to arrive home.
He said: 'Every time a car passed by she would go
to see.
'She was getting ready to go to work at around
5.30am when she heard a noise, opened the front
door and saw his rucksack.
'When she opened it she discovered it contained
his head.
'I did not want to look but the people who saw it
said they had gouged out his eyes and cut off his
tongue,' said the horrified relative.
Neighbours living close to the crime scene
reported hearing a woman screaming: 'My God,
it's Joao! It’s Joao’s head.'
From what I know, he didn't have any enemies
and neither did his wife,' the relative added.In a
statement Mr Santos' widow said the couple had
not been subjected to any threats.
Lead murder investigator Rafael Rangel from the
14th Military Police Battalion (BPM) in Rio, said
witnesses saw armed men kidnap the
businessman. 'We believe that the people who took
him knew the family’s routine,' said Rangel.
Investigators are working on the hypothesis that
Mr Santos could have been murdered by a drugs
gang because of Mrs Silva's work at a military
police base in a local slum.
The Police Pacification Unit in the Morro do Sao
Carlos is one of dozens set up in Rio's favelas to
retake control of the city's slums from violent drug
traffickers.
However, according to police chief Rafael Rangel,
Mrs Silva worked as a social worker in the base
and didn't patrol the streets or make arrests like
other police officers.
He told Brazil's O Dia newspaper the motives of
the murder are still unclear.
He said: 'Mrs Silva has no idea who would have
done this. Neither she, her husband or any other
member of the family have suffered any type of
threat as far as she knows.
'There is nothing that would justify such a
barbarous crime.'
Santos did not have a police record.
Later today Brazilian police said body parts
dumped beside a city river were believed to be
those of Mr Santos.
The player's brother-in-law told Brazil's Globo G1
website that family members had positively
identified a torso found next to the Guandu river in
Queimados, greater Rio de Janeiro, by a birth
mark on Mr Santos' stomach.
A police spokesman said other body parts had
also been found in the area and were being DNA
tested.
He said the murder bears the hallmarks of an
execution by drug gangsters, but stressed that
"every line of investigation" is still open.
The couple had been together for 11 years and
were described as ‘lovely’ by neighbours.
'They were a happy, quiet couple,' said a
neighbour, who asked not to be identified. 'But you
never know what may have motivated a crime as
stupid and as senseless as this.'
Mr Santos’ played as a professional footballer
between 1996 and 2005 - during which he scored
33 goals in 103 matches as a striker. Nicknamed
Humble Hero, he was signed to a number of
second division teams. He also played abroad for
Swedish Club Oster Vaxjo and Olimpia in
Honduras.
A recent United Nations report into drug
trafficking-related crime in Brazil found that more
than half of the homicides, robberies and thefts
have a direct or indirect link with this criminal
activity.
Culled from UK Daily Mail