The accused woman lived with the cheated couple for almost sixteen months, reports The Guardian. She didn’t have to pay for anything in their house in Joinville, her room was full of toys and during her stay there she had a celebration of her alleged twelfth birthday.
De Oliveira’s case caused quite a stir in Brazil. Above all, questions prevail as to how she managed to play the charade for so long. After her arrest, it turned out that she had committed similar frauds in several other Brazilian states.
The couple with whom De Oliveira lived said that he first met her in an Evangelical church, where she introduced herself to them as 18-year-old Gabrielle. She claimed that she had financial and health problems, which is why they took her in. De Oliveira then told them that she is actually eleven and looks older because her father forces her to take hormones and sexually abuses her. She also managed to persuade the generous couple not to send her to school and formally adopt her, because her father could find her because of that.
The fact that it was a fraud was revealed only by the aunt of one of the deceived, who visited the family and became suspicious. On the Internet, she found a three-year-old case from Rio de Janeiro, where De Oliveira deceived another family in the same way. She showed the evidence to the duped couple, who reported the fraudster to the police.
Police officer Rodrigo Bueno Gusso, who is leading the investigation, said De Oliveira admitted to lying to get financial support. From her other alleged victims, the police received photos and videos in which the woman uses a pacifier or baby bottle or talks like a small child. “Whenever she realized that her lie would soon be found out, she disappeared. This time she didn’t have time because she was arrested,” said Gusso.
The first record of a case where De Oliveira pretended to be a child comes from the end of the first decade of this century, when she came to the police station in her native state of Ceará and claimed that she was twelve years old and that her parents were sexually abusing her and forcing her into prostitution. Subsequently, she was sent to psychiatry and that was the end of the case.
Attorney Rafael Luiz Siewert, who was assigned to defend her, says that the case does have “elements that justify a request for a psychiatric evaluation.” The judge granted this request, and a possible trial date will be set when experts determine whether De Oliveira is able to stand before him. Until then, he remains in custody.
