Cops in Brazil have arrested a serial killer who drank his victims’ blood and ate their eyes and ears after killing them.

Military Police (Brazil’s preventive police force) officers captured Djalma Campos Figueiredo, 46, in the city of Cuiaba in the west-central Brazilian state of Mato Grosso on Wednesday, 12th January.

He had already been sentenced by the Court of Justice of Rondonia in the city of Porto Velho in the northern Brazilian state of Rondonia to 42 years in prison for several counts of aggravated murder.

An arrest warrant for a pending sentence of 26 years and four months in prison was issued against him on 30th September last year.

According to the Civil Police (Brazil’s investigative police force), the man would eat his victims’ eyes and ears and drink their blood after killing them. His crimes took place in and around the city of Ji-Parana, also in the state of Rondonia.

It is not clear how many victims the man had, though the widely accepted definition of a ‘serial killer’ is someone who has killed three or more people.

Military Police officers were able to arrest him after they received an anonymous tip-off that a fugitive from justice was in a residence in Cuiaba’s Tijucal neighbourhood.

Only upon arriving on the scene did they realise it was Figueiredo, who had until then managed to travel while evading capture by using fake documents. The officers then handcuffed him and took to the police station.

The serial killer had gone on the run on a previous occasion after damaging his ankle tag, and he was captured in the city of Ji-Parana in Rondonia State and later sent to prison in 2018.

It is not clear how he managed to escape this time round.