Judgment of those accused of murdering Nicinha will take place this Thursday

Two of those accused of the death of Nilce de Souza Magalhães, fisher and affected by the Jirau hydroelectric plant, will be judged by the Jury Court in Porto Velho, in the state of Ronônia.

This week, on Thursday (23), will be held the hearing of the Court of Jury of two of the accused of participating in the murder of Nilce de Souza Magalhães, Nicinha. Defendants Edione Pessoa da Silva and Leonardo Batista da Silva are charged respectively with murder and concealment of corpses and will be tried at 8 am at the Fouad Darwich Zacharias Criminal Forum, located at Avenida Rogério Weber, 1928, in Porto Velho ( RO).

Nicinha was a member of the Movement of the People Affected by Dams (MAB) and had her remains recognized on June 24^th at the IML in Porto Velho by one of her three daughters. Already in an advanced state of decomposition, her bones were found in the lake of Jirau’s dam five months after she was killed. As indications of execution, the body had a mark on the skull and had her hands and feet bound by ropes to a stone. The first hearing of the Jury Court was scheduled at the end of 2016, but it was redesignated by the absence of the DNA test and the thalatoscopy to confirm that the remains actually belonged to the victim.

The Movement of People Affected by Dams, MAB and Nicinha’s family members are waiting for the second civil police’s inquire to investigate other participants and to further motivations of the crime. The first investigation presents several gaps, such as vestiges of corporal fight at the scene of the crime, diverging from the version presented by the defendants, and contradictions of the defendants and their relatives statements.

Nilce was killed a month after attending a meeting in the Brazilian political capital city, Brasilia (December 2015) with the Federal Public Ministry and the Jirau’s dam company consortium Energia Sustentável Brasil (ESBR), to make the statements in complaint regarding the dam. This meeting was assured after the pressure made by the people affected when they blocked the highway BR 364 which makes the entry towards the hydro-plant.

In the same period, other MAB leaders began to suffer threats in the region and continue to be vulnerable due to the omission of effective actions by the Brazilian State to guarantee protection.

One of the denounces made by the people affected by dams were the continuous expansion of the Jirau’s dam lake and the impacts caused to the people that live from the forests with the flooding of the area.

The National Water Agency recognized the condition of risk at the locality of Abunã and determined the reallocation of all affected to a safe place and the Federal Public Ministry filed a public civil action in the 5th Federal Court of Justice in Rondônia to comply with the Fishing Activities Program; But the request was initially dismissed by the magistrate.

In a note, MAB’s national coordination states:
“MAB demands justice for Nilce de Souza Magalhães, that all those involved in this murder should be presented and judged and that the real motivations of the crime can be revealed. We demand Justice for the life of Nicinha and for all her history of struggle in respect to her memory. In addition to the arrest of the killers, we demand that all rights violated by the Jirau Hydroelectric Power Plant in Abunã and other riverine communities can be repaired and guaranteed. We repudiate all violence and threats against human rights defenders of populations affected by dams and demand their effective protection. “