Man Who Gave Wife Rat Poison That Also Killed Breastfeeding Baby Is To Go On Trail

A court has ruled that a man who allegedly killed his wife and baby son by putting rat poison in his wife’s food will face trial by jury.

Luiz Edivaldo de Souza stands accused of killing his wife, 36-year-old Josiele Lopes, and their three-month-old son in the Brazilian municipality of Rio dos Cedros in September last year.

He was formally charged in October last year and a court has recently decided that he will face trial by jury in his hometown of Itapema.

Newsflash

The dead bodies of Lopes and her baby son were found by the police on 23rd September last year, having been missing since the 15th of the same month.

During that time, the suspect, then 34, had sent messages to his wife’s relatives, posing as her, before blocking the contacts.

Cops started to investigate the case after the woman’s eldest son, 17, went to the police and filed a police report.

Newsflash

They concluded that the man had spiked his wife’s food with rat poison and that, after eating, she breastfed her baby son with her contaminated breast milk.

The woman then began to feel ill and asked her husband to take her to hospital.

However, he allegedly drove them instead to a wooded area in Rio dos Cedros, some 118 kilometres (73 miles) from their home in Itapema, where he buried the two, who were, by then, dead.

Newsflash

The police believe he committed the crime because his wife had asked for a separation.

The defendant’s legal team has until the end of next week to appeal the decision.

If the decision is not appealed, the court will set a date for the trial, when the defendant will respond to charges of homicide, concealment of the corpse and procedural fraud.