True Crime: Jilted Brazilian lover's cold-blooded murder | 60 Minutes Australia

you're about to see the very best of police detective work but it's born out of the very worst of mankind Cecilia Haddad was a young Brazilian woman a successful mining executive who'd been living in Australia for a number of years in 2018 she was murdered by a jealous ex-boyfriend Marcelo Santoro was also from Brazil and it's where he fled to immediately after killing Cecilia he probably thought he'd gotten away with his terrible crime but he was wrong on assignment for 60 Minutes nines Christina Hearn reports Santoro didn't count on the resolve of New South Wales police officers to bring him to Justice police emergency [Music] caller's distress is obvious and understandable okay just stay on the phone with me getting the police on the way as we're talking okay just stay on the phone at a secluded beach in an affluent suburb on Sydney Harbor Christine Baird and her husband have just found a dead body you don't know who this person is no as the operator asks more questions a young woman the realization of what might have happened becomes even more upsetting for Christine I've got teenage daughters I said very Cecilia where is she she hasn't called I knew something was up Cecilia Haddad was 38 independent intelligent and loving life she'd move to Australia from Brazil four years earlier in 2014 on her very first day here she'd met fellow Brazilians Carol Kamara and Rita martial the trio became instant friends are just this beautiful bright I'm happy amazing woman yeah she she was just so fun a very strong woman you're just getting inspired by being around her you would know Cecilia was there because she just filled the whole space with high energy with her laughter [Music] been five years now since Cecilia died but for Rita and Carol it still feels like yesterday as painful as the memories are though they want the world to know what happened to their beautiful friend because they're convinced talking about her murder might in fact save lives but it's not easy the what ifs continue to haunt them I wish I had called the police I blame myself for what happened to Caesar I would have done so much more so much better for my friend if I knew she was in danger Carol you do know there's only one person to blame for her death [Music] yeah it's not you it's this man caught on CCTV fleeing Australia 24 hours after the murder who is solely to blame Marcelo Santoro was a controlling and jealous ex-boyfriend who unwilling to accept the end of a year-long relationship with Cecilia decided to make her life hell stalking and threatening her even forcing himself into her apartment she ran into the bedroom and she locked herself in and she got all the furniture she had around her and barricaded herself into the bedroom and she was shouting at him to leave and he was punching the door and he was trying to go in but always saying to her I just just want to talk to you you just need to listen [Music] Cecilia was loved for her compassion but in some ways it was her undoing she refused to believe Santoro who was also from Brazil would ever physically harm her and wouldn't report him to the police perhaps knowing this centauro's harassment increased a week before her death Cecilia was desperate for a break and flew to Perth to visit Carroll and Rita said to her said don't go back he's dangerous he can do something to you don't go back to put to Sydney stay here work from home and she said no I need to be there for work I need to go back but when she got home to Sydney there was another shock Cecilia discovered centauro had secretly cut himself a key to her apartment and had been letting himself in whenever he wanted she called me straight away and she was so upset and she was shouting on the phone and very distressed and she said I told him not to be my apartment anymore and I know he was here I can smell him I can see his hairs all over my white floor and she was just really really annoyed by this situation he was breaking into her apartment he was clearly stalking her why didn't she go to the police she didn't want him to have a record she wanted him gone but she didn't wish him bad Cecilia was increasingly frightened audio messages she sent Carol reveal centauro's Obsession had reached a dangerous new level so she says she's home now cooking some soap but in the dark because she doesn't want him to know that she's home she was taking a shower with the lights off and then she goes to say I know I'm being paranoid no he follows me and there was a cry for help yeah so it's heartbreaking she obviously doesn't know the extent of the danger she's in exactly she was afraid but she thought she had the handle on him and that she was in control sadly she was wrong to dodge Santoro Cecilia stayed in hotels or with friends but that just made him more frantic the day before she was murdered CCTV cameras captured him leaving his home and making repeated visits to Cecilia's apartment on the Friday he had about five trips down there right throughout the day and throughout the evening where he keeps going down spends a bit of time comes home not for long before he's out again and it's quite striking the the stalking behavior that he's engaging in [Music] the New South Wales police detectives John Edwards and hanapaka the warning signs about what was about to happen are all too obvious don't let it escalate don't put up with it if there's behavior that you're uncomfortable with then then put a stop to it early and that's not just the victim of their friends as well on the day of her death Cecilia was here at her apartment for the first time that week after discovering that centauro had finally booked a flight home to Brazil in just four days time he was going to be out of her life forever it's the relief she needed to finally feel safe enough to return home tragically it would prove to be a fatal decision one of the last things she said to me was I will drive him to the airport and I said are you insane are you crazy you're going to drive this man to the airport and then she said you don't understand Carol I need to see his back when he walks through that gate I need to see him going because I'll be free she was a very strong woman but in the end her strength became her weakness absolutely Cecilia would a look after many people but she obviously didn't look after herself enough 7 30 on the morning of April the 28th 2018 Marcelo Santoro left his home and walked 10 minutes to Cecilia her dad's apartment he knew she was there he buzzed in the apartment to try to come up and she said to him you're not coming up I'm not talking to you just go I don't want to see you um and he wasn't taking it he was not taking No as an answer Santoro hung around Cecilia's apartment block for a few hours before finally just after 10 a.m he used his newly cut key to gain access by seven minutes past ten police believe Cecilia was already dead and finally I get this message Carol um they found a body and my wall just stopped [Music] it was very obvious to us very start that it was Santoro and the friends in the family came forward very quickly homicide investigations are never easy but straight away New South Wales detectives John Edwards and hanapaka identified Marcelo Santoro as the prime suspect in the murder of Cecilia Haddad he was her ex-boyfriend but they still had to catch him a task made more difficult because he'd fled to his homeland Brazil a country that doesn't have an extradition treaty with Australia the problem there was that their Constitution doesn't actually allow them to extradite their citizens they then said but if you want to set the brief here they'll prosecute him in Brazil and the commissioner got straight on board with that we were then committed to you know pulling a brief together and giving it to the Brazilians to prosecute so you basically had to do all the work and then hand it all over absolutely what had happened to piecing the crime together was a slow and painstaking process but they had technology on their side how crucial was that CCTV that you managed to get oh super crucial and amazing you know for a jury to see something like that it's not just talking about it it's not just people giving that evidence to talk about it it's a visual that you know paints a picture for them that they don't normally get to see to determine Santoro's movements and Link him to the secluded beach where Cecilia's body was found police tracked his phone through the pings it made with mobile Towers in the area so up here number two is Santoro's house number three is Cecilia Haddad's house Santoro's phone has connected with a cell tower so we believe he's driven down here to the Waterfront looking for somewhere to dump her body you can see all those phone pinks he's driving all over route to where he dumped the body so he's looking for a place yeah absolutely so when he didn't find anywhere appropriate down here he's driven we believe right round here around Rod point and again these are all Waterfront areas where he's looking for somewhere to dump the body and we follow the phone all the way down but in the game of proof a map showing where his mobile phone went simply wasn't enough they needed Visual Evidence and we sent police out to drive and literally look at every house every business along the way go and knock on the door get their footage and then over time place it together could you guess how how many cameras you had to go through to piece that all together hundreds the efforts was rewarded centauro was seen driving Cecilia's red Fiat in the hours after she was murdered but even more importantly the CCTV footage of the red Fiat was an exact match both in time and location to the tracking of centuro's mobile phone this is the side street beside her house you'll see that's her car coming around the corner and that's the first time we actually see the car on this evening as it drives along it goes past a series of cameras so this is centuro driving Cecilia's car with her body in it yes we believe so yes there it is very clearly the last shot we get of the car is that one it's the second car there following Along coming round the pub just a few hundred meters down the road centuro dumped Cecilia's body at around 7pm nine hours after he killed her within 20 minutes he was home again but what he did next was even more staggering the two CCTV cameras at centuro's home recorded his every move this is back at Santoro's house you can see him here he's walking across his forecourt and you can see the wet footprints that he's leaving behind he's left his shoes on the beach and he's walking in wet socks and which you can see on the video as it goes through so that's his the four chord of his premises he then walks around the back there's another camera and you can see him here he's walking to the door of his unit he's just opened the laundry door here and you can see he strips all his clothes off puts them in the washing machine he's trying to get rid of any evidence any evidence that there may be on them you know that was a real yeah we've got him moment and had no idea that that camera was there I believe clueless to the fact the camera was there but Santoro was including on some things he uses Cecilia's phone to text messages to some of her friends saying she was going to the Blue Mountains and to make the story more believable after he dumped her body he dumped her car at a local train station however once again the CCTV cameras gave him up that's it there you see the red car and we will track it um across as many cameras as we can find all the way across to the West ryde railway station commuter car park where we ultimately find it a couple of days afterwards morning before Cecilia's body was even found centuro knew he had to get out of the country jumping into an Uber he headed to the airport during the trip in plain sight of the Uber driver Santoro disposed of what would end up being the most important piece of evidence in this case Cecilia's car keys what did that Uber driver tell you he ended up being quite a key witness he was um he had a great memory which was wonderful yeah so if you could just tell us where you merged over and one of the main things that he told us was in that travel he drove over the Gladesville bridge and as he drove over the Gladesville Bridge Santoro asked him to to travel on the left-hand side as they were driving he um put the window down and then threw something out the window that the Uber driver said sounded like keys I mean this is a a big bridge and there's actually barriers at the top it is remarkably actually managed to throw the keys out yeah that's right and it's a far distance as well he's done a good effort to get them over it was obviously pre-planned and he thought about it as as he was approaching the bridge divers three weeks but eventually they found Cecilia's car keys in the river and there was no mistaking the iconic Christ the Redeemer key ring from her home city of Rio in Brazil so by that stage we had seized her car and um had done our crime scene examinations and when we took that key to the to the car magic it it opens the car it really did cement the case against him three months after she was killed Brazilian police arrested Marcelo Santoro and charged him with the murder of Cecilia Haddad but it would take another four years before Santoro's trial was heard in June this year remarkably over just two days Hannah what was it like dealing with the Brazilian court system we were told that it would probably be wrapped up in one day possibly too um something like this in Australia would have been weeks possibly months going through that evidence where jurisdiction that every witness comes forward and gives that evidence whereas in Brazil John and I were able to give a lot of that evidence and provide a lot of that evidence because of what we knew about the job I think on the first night we were there till midnight and the second day till 2 A.M in the morning by the time we had a result during the trial run largely on the evidence collected by New South Wales police centuro ended up confessing to killing Cecilia but claimed he didn't mean it the jury didn't believe him though he was found guilty of murder and was sentenced to 27 years in jail for Cecilia's best friends Carol Kamara and Rita martial that wasn't anywhere near long enough he took away many lives the life of a daughter a life of an auntie a sister a friend that we're never gonna have back I cannot see him regretting that you don't think he has any remorse no no what he regretted was to be caught um so we saw no sorrow in his words he wasn't um apologetic he wasn't he was just what he is he's a coward he's a horrible person and he's exactly what he deserves should be understandably Cecilia's death has left everyone who loved her heartbroken but five years on Carol and Rita say there is still questions that must be answered for most visitors Sydney Harbor is spectacular but not for Carol Kamara and Rita martial who've traveled here from Perth for them it's a place of sadness where their best friend Cecilia her dad was murdered by her ex-boyfriend Marcelo Santoro Sydney is just where she she was taken from us and coming back here it's it's something that we we must do to find closure and be able to move on we haven't been giving an opportunity to grieve our friend [Music] I think of her floating on that River at Night by herself and dying on the hands of that man I cannot pass that moment I cannot move forward coming to the secluded beach where Cecilia's body was discovered is important Carol and Rita need to grieve just had to think of her here by herself in the dark left alone but they also want to meet someone they consider very special Police emergency this is Tammy what do you need the police please at the water we've found a body in the water Christine Baird made the triple zero call after finding Cecilia know that we looked after her and the care she showed still means the world to Carol and Rita we were just putting our boats in the water over there and as we were pushing them out um which I saw her lying in the water and she was lying face down so we turned her over she just looked so beautiful and so peaceful something I hope you can take some comfort in that because obviously it wasn't a peaceful time for her but when we found her she looked peaceful yeah it's sad it's sad but I'm I'm so glad because I can see how beautiful you always are on your heart so warm yeah yeah she needed she has a special she has a special place my children call her my lady in the river oh that's beautiful yeah yeah do you think he walked he and dropped her I do think he went that way Christine's words are enormously comforting even five years on a reminder if ever it was needed that Cecilia's short life mustn't be for nothing Carol and Rita are determined to do whatever they can to make sure what happened to their beautiful friend stops happening to other women I never saw ceciles the face of domestic violence she was just this powerful woman speak up and talk to the police because we are not Superwoman and we can't really protect everybody but there are people that can be the voice for the ones that think they don't need help do you think if there was police intervention that Cecilia would be alive today I think so I really know [Music] John Edwards and hanapaka agree their message is also clear they know it can be hard but they want to encourage people to get help even when the victims think they're okay the position of the friends is is very difficult because you don't want to betray the trust you can give them advice but when do you go against their wishes and go to the police regardless of what your friend wants that's a very very difficult situation but certainly if she had understood what the police would have done for her and maybe that's the role of friends trying to put her in contact with people who actually know what the police can do for you [Music] not a day that goes by that I don't think what Cecilia would be doing [Music] Cecilia is not a floating body in in the river she's a force of nature she is someone that you need your look and think of as an amazing amazing person that came here to teach us so many lessons and will be forever loved by us [Music] domestic violence is a curse in Australia as Christine reported police are there to help hello I'm Tara Brown thanks for watching 60 Minutes Australia subscribe to our Channel now for brand new stories and exclusive Clips every week and don't miss out on our extra minute segments and full episodes of 60 Minutes on 9now.com and the nine Now app

Channel: 60 Minutes Australia

Views: 1,594,665

Keywords: 60 Minutes, 60 Minutes Australia, Liz Hayes, Tara Brown, Tom Steinfort, 60Mins, Amelia Adams, news, world news, news australia, investigative journalism, 60 minutes australia youtube, 60 minutes youtube, 60 minutes episodes, 60 minutes australia episodes, 60 minutes australia, 60 minutes, cecilia haddad, marcel santoro, brazil, brazilians in australia, murder, crime, police investigation, detective work, crime scene, body in the river, brazilian court, rio de janeiro

Id: ejffi1nxOD8

Length: 27min 55sec (1675 seconds)

Published: Sun Aug 27 2023