Woman whose father was murdered when she was nine becomes a cop to catch his killer | World news

A police officer who signed up to avenge her murdered father helped arrest his killer 25 years after the crime.

Gislayne Silva de Deus, from Boa Vista, northern Brazil, was nine when her father Givaldo was shot dead in a bar in 1999 over a £20 debt.

Givaldo’s killer, Raimundo Alves Gomes, took his victim to hospital but then disappeared.

He was arrested in 2013, tried and sentenced to 12 years, but was allowed to remain out of prison while he fought a series of appeals against the sentence.

After the last appeal was rejected in 2016, an arrest warrant was issued for him, but he disappeared again.

The news devastated Gislayne, who was now in her late twenties and working as a lawyer, and the rest of Givaldo’s family.

“We got used to living with uncertainty and always wondered if we would ever be able to locate him,” she told Brazilian news site G1.

In 2022, Gislayne became a prison guard and said she “always imagined (Gomes) arriving there to serve his sentence.”

But it remained a daydream even after one of her uncles saw Gomes later that year in the town where the murder took place.

The uncle alerted authorities, but Gomes disappeared before they could arrest him.

She then applied to join her state’s civilian police force, becoming a clerk in July this year and immediately applying for the homicide unit.

Once inside, she helped gather information on Gomes’ whereabouts – a rural area just outside Boa Vista – and issued the formal warrant for his arrest.

Gislayne, now 35, was finally able to confront her father’s killer at the police station and tell him why he had been arrested, in a moment that was filmed and shared online.

“It’s thanks to me that you’re here,” she told him, adding, “You’re going to pay now.”

It took me a moment to build up the courage to face him, Gislayne said, continuing, “When I saw that the man responsible for my father’s death was finally in handcuffs, I couldn’t hold back the tears.

“It was an explosion of feelings that turned into tears of relief because it seemed like this day would never come.

‘My father was an honest and hardworking man. He encouraged us to study and spent time helping us with homework and times tables. He was always very close to us and caring.

‘My sisters and I went through very difficult times after we lost him. What happened could easily have sent us in a different direction, but our mother always taught us to follow the right path.”

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