(Reuters) – An indigenous group in the Amazon rainforest region where British journalist Dom Phillips and indigenous expert Bruno Pereira were murdered in June has released one of its suspects. I lamented what happened.
In a statement, the Indigenous Union of the Javari Valley (Univaja) said the man’s release showed the failure of Brazilian authorities to prosecute the case and the failure to contain organized crime in the region.
A federal judge in Amazonas state Wednesday decided to grant provisional liberty to Laurimar Lopez Alves, known as Caboclo, a fisherman accused of involvement in the murders of Phillips and Pereira.
The judge said Alves had been under provisional arrest for three months and could not be detained further without “strong grounds” to detain him.
Alves was arrested by federal police in August. Local media reported that a fisherman was suspected of being involved in hiding the bodies of Phillips and Pereira, whose bodies were found buried in the rainforest after they confessed to police.
Federal police did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the judge’s decision.
“It’s been five months since Bruno and Dom died. The authorities in charge of resolving the case are very slow. It seems that the investigation is either being conducted in an ineffective way or simply stopped.
Phillips, a freelancer who has written for The Guardian, The Washington Post, and other prominent publications, joined Pereira on a research trip to the Javari Valley, a remote jungle area on the Peru border. I was out. Indigenous peoples, cocaine smuggling gangs, illegal hunters and fishermen.
They disappeared on June 5, and their bodies were found by Brazilian authorities a few days later. At that time, the police issued seven arrest warrants.
The Amazonas court did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Reported by Carolina Pulice and Anthony Boadle.and Leslie Adler
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