Court transfers murder trial in Santarém to Belém; Investigations indicate that the victim was killed by mistake

The transfer of the jury, signed on October 27, 2026, considered the strong repercussion of the case, the history of attempted murders against the defendant and the public repercussion generated since the crime, which occurred in January 2021.

Elieldo Castro Rego disappeared on January 3, 2021, at the age of 23, after being seen in a bar in the Amparo neighborhood accompanied by three men who made him get into a car. The body of the young man, who worked in informal motorcycle taxi transportation, was located twelve days later, on January 15, tied up and in an advanced state of decomposition in a forested area close to the Ponta de Pedras community branch.

At the time of the arrests, carried out in February 2021 in Santarém and Goiânia (GO) by the National Force, police investigations indicated that Elieldo had been killed by mistake, in the context of searches for an alleged target linked to conflicts between criminal factions and an attack previously suffered by one of the accused.

For the rapporteur of the case, judge Jorge Luiz Lisboa Sanches, the public exposure of the defendant — associated by name and through images with armed groups in reports — and the history of violence, including a shooting attack suffered by Tiago in 2020 attributed to factional disputes, justify the removal of the jury from the district of origin.

Although the Public Prosecutor's Office and the court of the 3rd Criminal Court of Santarém expressed their opposition to the change — arguing that the time elapsed since the public demonstrations from 2021 to 2022 and the wide jury base in the district would be sufficient —, the TJPA board understood that the well-founded doubt about impartiality prevails. With the decision, the case will be sent to one of the Jury Courts of the District of Belém.