A daughter accused of sending her mum to a psychiatric unit so she could rent out her home for Brazil’s lucrative carnival season has been seized by police.

Terrified Maria Aparecida Paiva was snatched off the street by paramedics and bundled into an ambulance after her daughter reported her as insane.

Then horrified Maria, 65, was kept in secure units for days before medics realised she was completely sane.

Maria told local media: “I was leaving the bank and a paramedic, on the same pavement, grabbed me and threw me inside the ambulance.

“The guy said, ‘We’re going to Petropolis because it’s better there.’ But who’s doing this? ‘Your family.’

“I fell into despair, screaming. We arrived in Petropolis, they locked me in a windowless room without anything and I stayed there for three days.”

And when Maria thought she was finally being discharged, she was simply transferred to another clinic and held there for days, too.

She was finally released when doctors realised she had no mental health issues.

Now her greedy daughter and son-in-law have been remanded in custody, accused of aggravated kidnapping.

Police Chief Felipe Santoro says the doctors who treated Maria will be questioned as part of the investigation.

He told local media: “It is unbelievable that the hospitalisation occurred without the victim having been previously evaluated by a psychiatric doctor.”

The clinics where Maria was allegedly held against her will from 6th February have been named as Clinica Revitalis and Vista Alegre.

Daughter Patricia de Paiva Reis and her husband, Rafael Machado, were arrested in the city of Rio de Janeiro on 24th February.

Maria believes her daughter had her sectioned because Reis was angry that she had reported her to the child protection services for child abuse.

She told local media: “There is also a financial issue involved because she’s afraid of losing her son’s child support, and if this accusation goes to trial, she’ll lose it because the father is seeking custody of their child.”

And to add insult to injury, added Maria, Reis even rented Maria’s apartment out for Carnival.

She said: “I never thought this would happen. This is so true, it’s all about the money, because the day she put me in the clinic, she hired two cleaners, cleaned my apartment, and rented it out.”

Maria has been left traumatised by the experience, telling local media: “I’m afraid to go outside. And I’m trying to compose myself.”

Local media report that Reis and Machado have a disabled two-year-old son, who has been taken in by a children’s shelter.

Reis also has a nine-year-old son from a previous relationship.

Maria accuses Reis of neglecting and psychologically abusing her children.

According to an ex-boyfriend of Reis, she failed to take her eldest son to school and would leave him without food while she spent the whole day on her phone.

Local media report that she is facing five legal proceedings for slander, fraud, extortion, and theft from a vehicle allegedly committed in 2019 and 2020.

She is also being investigated in two separate cases for making false accusations of gender-based violence against her exes.

Local media add that it is not the first time she has tried to have her mother sectioned.

And they say the couple also once tried to get Machado’s brother sectioned.

The brother, Rodrigo Machado Costa, died seven months later, on 20th September 2022, in suspicious circumstances.