Tiago Henrique GOMES DA ROCHA
Classification: Serial killer
Characteristics: The security guard claims he killed out of rage after being sexually abused by a neighbour as a child
Number of victims: 16 - 39 +
Date of murders: 2011 - 2014
Date of arrest: October 14, 2014
Date of birth: 1988
Victims profile: Homeless people, women and homosexuals (his youngest victim was a 14-year-old girl and 22 of his victims were women)
Method of murder: Shooting (.38 revolver)
Location: Goiânia, state of Goiás, Brazil
Status: In prison awaiting trial
Tiago Henrique Gomes da Rocha is a former Brazilian security guard who has claimed to have killed 39 people. He approached his victims on a motorbike and shouted "robbery" before shooting them. However, he never took anything. He targeted homeless people, women and homosexuals in Goiás. His youngest victim was a 14-year-old girl killed in January, 2014 and 16 of his victims were women.
Gomes da Rocha was arrested after being caught riding a motorbike with a fake plate. He earlier caught the attention of police after they discovered that he was facing trial for stealing the numberplate off a motorbike at a supermarket in Goiania in January 2014. A motorbike, stolen plates and the suspected murder weapon, a .38 revolver, were retrieved from a home he shared with his mother.
He attempted suicide in his prison cell on 16 October 2014 by slashing his wrists with a smashed light bulb. Gomes da Rocha has claimed to have gained murderous urges after being sexually abused by his neighbor at age 11.
Wikipedia.org
Captive Brazilian Beast serial killer asks police if he can murder other prisoners
By Gerard Couzens - Mirror.co.uk
Oct 21, 2014
Crazed Brazilian serial killer Tiago Rocha has asked police guarding him in his cell if it would be okay to murder other inmates.
The notorious motorcycle murderer has confessed he still feels the urge to kill despite admitting to 39 shootings.
Police chief Eduardo Prado, one of those in charge of the investigation into the slayings, said: “He asked whether he would face trial if he killed someone else in custody.
“He still wants to kill. His attitude is very strange.”
The 26-year-old, captured last week after a four-year rampage, claims he killed out of rage after being sexually abused by a neighbour as a child.
He has confessed to killing homeless people and transvestites at random in his home city of Goiania before starting to kill young women this year as he cruised the streets on a motorbike.
His last victim, Ana Lidia Gomes, was just 14 when he shot her dead as she left her home.
He was caught after a failed attempt to kill another victim on October 12 who later identified him along with a bar worker.
His modus operandi was always to shout ‘robbery’ before pulling the trigger but he would flee the scene without taking anything.
Police chiefs have said they wouldn’t be surprised if Rocha, whose full name is Tiago Henrique Gomes da Rocha, is found guilty of more than the 39 murders he has confessed to.
He has been put on suicide watch after surviving slashing his wrists in his cell with a smashed light bulb.
Mr Prado said: “We’re monitoring him constantly. He doesn’t love himself and he’s already attempted suicide.
“He constantly asks for dental floss to take with him when I’m with him. When you ask him if it’s so he can kill himself he just laughs sarcastically.”
If Gomes da Rocha ends up being convicted of the crimes he is said to have confessed to, he will gain a place in the record books as one of the world’s worst serial killers.
The list of the 15 most prolific modern serial killers is topped by Colombian Luis Garavito, a child murderer and rapist known as La Bestia or The Beast.
He is thought to have killed more than 400 mainly street children. His proven victim count is 138.
Pedro Rodrigues Filho, Brazil’s most prolific killer, claimed to have killed over 100 victims, 47 of them inmates. He was convicted of killing 71 people.
He killed his first two victims at the age of 14 and murdered his father and ate a piece of his heart.
'I'm a victim here, too': Confessed Brazilian serial killer says childhood sex abuse, women's rejection drove him to murder 39 people
By Meg Wagner - New York Daily News
Tuesday, October 21, 2014
Tiago Rocha, 26, was arrested last week after he confessed to killing at least 39 people over four years. He said his rage started when he was sexually abused as an 11-year-old boy. He targeted young women because he 'was rejected a lot in the past,' he said.
The Brazilian man who confessed to murdering 39 people said his craving to kill started when he was sexually abused as a child — and the urge only got more intense when women romantically rejected him as he grew older.
Tiago Gomes da Rocha admitted last week to killing dozens of people, including teenage girls and homeless men, over the last four years in the city of Goiania.
The 26-year-old was arrested after police linked a gun in his home to the murders of six women this year.
Rocha's murderous urges started when he was 11 years old, he told the Sun from his jail cell.
"I had an ordinary childhood until I was 11. Then I was sexually abused by a neighbor," he said. "After that I felt like I was nothing.
"In a way I'm a victim here, too," he said.
His rage grew with him through his adolescence. When he reached adulthood, it peaked, he said.
"When I was 22, I couldn't stop myself anymore. It was like I had to do it," he said.
That's when he killed his first victim: a homeless person, he said.
Soon, he started targeting women and girls, he said. Some were as young as 14.
"I was rejected a lot in the past, so I directed part of my anger towards women," he told the newspaper.
Rocha said he shot many of his victims while speeding past them on his motorcycle. Some of the women were walking home when he shot them. Others were waiting at bus stops, he said.
"My mind went blank, but I would cry later," he said, noting that he was emotionless when he randomly selected his targets.
He also stabbed prostitutes and robbed stores, he said. Footage from one stickup helped police nab the serial killer earlier this month.
Previously, Rocha's lawyers said he confessed to crimes he didn't commit after police aggressively interrogated him.
But the 26-year-old again confirmed that he was the killer to the newspaper.
"I want to ask forgiveness," he said.
Blood on his hands: Brazilian murderer 'who killed 39 women' is pictured caged in prison as he admits he became a killer 'because he was sexually abused'
Tiago Henrique Gomes da Rocha, 26, has confessed to killing 39 people
This includes 16 women as well as homeless people and transvestites
Nine-month random killing spree ended last week when he was arrested
He reportedly called wardens and told them he was 'in the mood to kill'
By Matt Roper and Mark Duell for MailOnline
October 21, 2014
With his blood-covered arms sticking out through the bars of his prison cell, Tiago Henrique Gomes da Rocha has admitted to murdering at least 39 people - including 16 women as well as homeless people and transvestites.
The 26-year-old Brazilian serial killer, whose wrists were covered in his own blood after he attempted to slash them with a broken light bulb, has claimed he became a murderer because he was sexually abused as a child.
His nine-month random killing spree in Goiania, central Brazil, ended last week when he was arrested following a massive police manhunt.
rom his prison cell, Da Rocha told journalist James Young in The Sun: ‘I had an ordinary childhood until I was 11. Then I was sexually abused by a neighbour. After that I felt like I was nothing.
‘I felt the anger growing in me from that moment on. I’d started drinking a lot too. When I was 22, I couldn’t stop myself anymore. It was like I had to do it.’
Meanwhile it was also revealed yesterday that Da Rocha speed reads books from back to front.
The killer, who is being kept temporarily in a single cell in a prison in the city, reportedly called wardens in the early hours of yesterday and told them he was ‘in the mood to kill’.
Police chief Eduardo Prado told Brazil's Globo G1 website: ‘He asked the agents if he would answer criminally if he were to kill one of the other inmates.
‘We found this attitude very strange, as well as the disjointed things he's always saying.’
He added that, during the early hours of yesterday, Da Rocha read 40 magazines in quick succession - and from back to front.
He said: ‘It was a curious thing that he would read from the back forwards and very quickly, as if it were a task he was being made to do, reading aloud.’
He said that Da Rocha needs to be watched all the time: ‘Our concern is with observing him constantly inside the cell. He has no love for himself, he has already attempted suicide.
‘Always, when I am in the room, he asks for dental floss. I ask if is to kill himself with and he gives a sarcastic laugh.
‘Truly, when he is transferred to a long-term prison, that prison's management will have to have a very robust and more methodical control of the situation, which is actually highly dangerous.’
Da Rocha is alleged to have shot all his victims dead from a motorbike. They include a 14-year-old girl killed at a bus stop in February and two women in their mid-twenties murdered in May.
Officers swooped on Gomes da Rocha after discovering he was facing trial for stealing the numberplate on a motorbike at a supermarket in Goiania in January.
Days later he was stopped by police riding a motorbike with a fake plate.
The suspected murder weapon, a.38 revolver, was seized from the home he shared with his mum during a search along with a motorbike and stolen plates.
Speaking to Brazil's Jornal Nacional news programme on TV Globo, Da Rocha said he was motivated by ‘a great anger’ and that killing was the only way to ‘get it out of his system.’
He said: ‘I tried to do other things to get it out, but they didn't work’. He added: ‘When the thing comes and you have to do it. There's no way of explaining it.'
Sickening details emerge of how Brazilian serial killer liked to stab prostitutes, choke gays and shoot homeless people… as it’s revealed he was ENGAGED to a church girl who looked just like his favorite targets
Tiago Henrique Gomes da Rocha, 26, confessed to killing 39 people
He would kill his victims depending on who they were, following a set pattern for young women, homeless people, gays and prostitutes
It has now been revealed that he was in a serious relationship with a woman who looked similar to many of his victims
Rocha has confessed to killing at least 22 women and 17 men
The killer shot his victims from a motorbike while shouting 'robbery,' but would flee the scene without taking anything
By Pedro Oliveira Jr. for MailOnline
October 18, 2014
The serial killer always stuck to his system.
Prostitutes were stabbed. Homeless men were shot. Gays he choked.
And young women — the victims he came to savor killing the most — he would shoot in the chest.
That was the modus operandi of Tiago Henrique Gomes da Rocha, the Brazilian serial killer who has confessed to murdering at least 39 people in just three years, making him of the most prolific killers in the world.
Rocha, 26, was arrested Tuesday after being pulled over in the city of Goiania, when local police found he was facing trial for stealing a motorcycle's license plate in January.
He was stopped while riding with fake plates on the motorcycle he often used during the murders, when he would drive by and attack random victims before speeding away.
A day later, he confessed to killing 39 people — 15 young women as well as prostitutes and random people he thought to be gay or homeless.
In a sick twist, it has been revealed that Rocha was in a romantic relationship with a pretty church girl with long hair, her appearance similar to that of his victims, the newspaper Folha de S. Paulo reported.
Cops say he may have been engaged to the young woman, who would often take him to her Assembly of God church.
Rocha began killing in 2011, at first targeting homeless people, gays and prostitutes. His first victim was a man, the first of 17 males he would eventually kill.
This year, he turned his attention to young women.
His first young female victim was 14-year-old Bárbara Costa, who had been waiting for her grandmother in a public square on January 18 when a man riding a motorcycle shot her in the chest and left without taking anything.
The next day, 23-year-old Beatriz Moura was shot also by a man in a motorcycle. He once again didn't take anything.
In all, he killed 15 women in seven months in Goiania, a city of 1.3 million people located some 200 miles from the country's capital of Brasilia. They were ages 14 to 29.
Even as late as Sunday, he had once again tried to kill a woman — but the attempt was foiled when his gun didn't go off, and he ran away.
In an interview with Folha, he said he was 'moved by a greater power' and regrets the crimes.
'I wanted to say that I am remorseful, that I wanted to have a chance to pay for what I've done — to ask for forgiveness,' he told Folha.
Rocha spoke little, his eyes downcast. He paused frequently and gave short answers.
He said he was feeling 'badly, very badly' about the killings.
He wouldn't explain why he killed so many people, and avoided personal questions but to confirm that he had problems in his childhood.
It was 'stronger than me,' he told Folha. 'I couldn't explain.'
He was asked twice about the number of victims. The first time he refused to answer. The second, he said only: 'No comment.'
He would often drink before the killings because it would give him liquid courage to proceed, Folha reported.
While speaking to police, he would refer to his victims only as numbers.
'All the police officers who followed the interrogation were shocked by his coldness, not only with his modus operandi but also in the way he formulated his ideas,' interrogator Douglas Pedrosa, of the Goias Civil Police, told G1 news. 'He identified each victim by a number--number 30, number 12.'
Pedrosa says the killer remembers details of each of his dozens of crimes.
'After admitting to a crime, he would stay there for some five minutes in a catatonic state,' Pedroso told G1.
During those times, the killer told police, he would be thinking about the crime — reliving it, even. At times, he would have a smile on his face.
'After, he would give details about the place and what he was feeling,' Pedrosa told G1. 'He didn't have details of the faces, he had details of the violence.'
Cops say he was 'cold' during questioning and was visibly bothered by female police staff.
When women walked in he 'stopped talking, said he was bothered and that he wasn't going to talk anymore,' Pedrosa told G1.
Rocha's lawyer, Thiago Vidal, told Folha that he counseled the killer of his right to remain silent.
But Rocha pounded his fists on the interrogation table and insisted: 'No, I will talk.'
'I have to get this from inside me,' he said of the murders.
Vidal at first said Rocha had confessed on Monday under pressure from police. Then on Wednesday, he was interrogated once again — and the defense lawyer left the room 'perplexed.'
'At first I thought the police may have coerced him into confessing to a crime he didn't commit, but he narrated with richness of detail each of the deaths,' the lawyer told Folha.
While Rocha talked, the lawyer read through the police report detailing the confession from two days earlier. The killer made no mistakes in retelling his macabre story .
'He didn't hesitate,' Vidal told Folha. 'Everything fit.'
The lawyer said Rocha attempted suicide with shards from a light bulb on Thursday. He is now on suicide watch in jail and remains handcuffed.
He is expected to undergo a psychiatric evaluation.
Rocha was visited by his mother, an aunt and four other relatives on Friday after he asked for them.
Rocha's family described him to Folha as a quiet young man with few friends. He rarely went out to social events at night.
He lived with his mother and a brother and never met his dad. He was molested by a neighbor when he was 11.
Rocha graduated high school and worked for a couple of years in a private security firm. Police say he stole a .38-caliber gun from this job and used it in the murders.
For the last four months, he's worked a night security shift in a large hospital in Goiania.
Rocha say he killed because of the 'rage he felt against everything', which only subsided when he murdered.
He was arrested on Tuesday by a special police task force set up to catch the serial killer after the string of unexplained murders caused panic among the local population.
Families and friends of the women murdered this year staged a series of demonstrations to put pressure on the police and local government to solve the crime.
They wore white and carried photos of the victims.
Before pulling the trigger, Rocha would always shout 'robbery' — but then flee the scene without taking anything.
Officers swooped on Rocha when they discovered he was facing trial for stealing the number plate on a motorbike at a supermarket in Goiania in January.
Days later he was was stopped by police riding a motorbike with a fake plate.
The murder weapon, a.38 revolver, was seized from the home he shared with his mother during a search along with a motorbike and stolen plates.
Local reports said he told police before being taken to jail that he killed his victims to alleviate feelings of anxiety.
The list of the 15 most prolific modern serial killers is topped by Colombian Luis Garavito, a child murderer and rapist known as 'La Bestia' or 'The Beast.' He is thought to have killed more than 400 people, mostly street children. His proven victim count is 138.
Pedro Rodrigues Filho, Brazil's most prolific killer, claimed to have killed more than 100 victims, 47 of them inmates. He was convicted of killing 71 people.
He killed his first two victims at the age of 14 and murdered his father and ate a piece of his heart.
Suspected Serial Killer in State of Goiás Treats Victims by Number, Police Say
By Juliana Coissi - Folha de S.Paulo
October 17, 2014
Police Commissioner Douglas Pedrosa, who headed the interrogation of the suspected serial killer in the capital city of Goiânia, said he was shocked during the first minutes of the testimony.
What is the name of the first woman you murdered? "It wasn't a woman. It was a man", Tiago Henrique Gomes da Rocha, 26, answered.
Not even the 150 police officers part of the task force that has been investigating for 70 days the murders that took place in the capital of the state of Goiás anticipated such a dramatic ending last Tuesday, October 14th, when the suspect was arrested.
According to the police, the suspect confessed to all 16 crimes under investigation and more, he confessed a total of 39 homicides. The first crimes date back to 2011.
The suspect's lawyer, Thiago Vidal, says his client denies all murders and that he only took up responsibility for them for feeling scared during the interrogation.
According to the Police Commissioner, Rocha spoke with his head up and was straight forward with his answers. He became annoyed with the presence of female officers, who subsequently left the room.
Instead of using the victims' names, the suspect chose to number them. "We asked him about the women and he said: 'Which number? Oh, victim number 3, victim number 5".
According to the police, victim number one is Diego Martins Mendes, 16. In 2011, the suspect approached Diego, under the assumption that he was gay, at a coach station.
Furthermore, the suspect convinced him to go to an overgrowth for sex. The act was never consummated, according to Rocha, but Diego was strangled. His body has never been found.
Two other men were the following victims: a former coworker, killed by stabbing and another man who Rocha also thought to be gay.
The subsequent targets were prostitutes and street dwellers. "Nobody would care about them", he told the police.
Rocha said to the police he was motivated by the urge to kill. "I am angry with the world", he said to the Commissioner.
On Sunday, October 12th, in a matter of hours the police did not come across Rocha, according to the Commissioner, in his last attempt of murder.
The victim was a woman but his gun failed. Rocha was open about approaching her, but claims he only wanted to mug her.
On Thursday, October 16th, Rocha was presented publicly by the police, when Family members of the murdered women shouted "murderer".
According to the Judiciary Policy in Goiás, the suspect tried to take his own life in the early hours by cutting his wrists with a broken lamp bulb.
In the morning, during the presentation, the crew was not able to see any injuries on the suspect.
Contribution by CARLA GUIMARÃES, in Goiânia
Translated by CRISTIANE COSTA LIMA
Brazilian serial killer suspect Thiago Henrique Gomes da Rocha, 26, 'confesses to 39 murders'
Loulla-Mae Eleftheriou-Smith - Independent.co.uk
October 17, 2014
A security guard in Brazil has confessed to killing at least 39 people “out of anger,” police have said.
Brazilian police said Thiago Henrique Gomes da Rocha, 26, targeted women, homeless people and homosexuals in the country’s central state of Goias.
Rocha was arrested on Tuesday. In his confession of the alleged murders, he said he killed because of his feelings of “fury,” which he felt “against everything” according to police.
Rocha’s feelings of fury reportedly only abated when he killed another person.
Rocha is understood to have demanded valuables from his victims before shooting them and leaving without the items.
Speaking at a news conference, Chief of Police Deusny Aparecido said Rocha “felt anger at everything and everyone,” Sky News reported.
“He had no link to any of his victims and chose them at random. It could have been me, you or your children,” Aparecido said.
Rocha labelled his victims by the numbers one to 39, according to a police official who had been present at the interrogations, the BBC reported. The official told a Brazilian TV channel: “We have been shocked by his coldness.”
Chief Police Detective Joao Gorski, told reporters: “I believe he is a serial killer. In the beginning, he killed at random, but by the end he had established a pattern”.
Rocha is currently awaiting a court hearing, but his lawyer claims he was coerced into confessing crimes he didn’t commit under aggressive questioning.
Police said Rocha attempted to commit suicide in his cell on Thursday with a broken lightbulb, but was stopped by a guard.
An investigator on the case, Norton Ferreira, said police had linked a found in Rocha’s home to the killing of at least six women this year, while Rocha confessed to at least 33 other murders dating back to early 2013.
