News Digest

Brazil hospital guard killed 39 ‘in anger at everyone and everything’

A hospital worker killed 39 people in 10 months out of “anger at everything and everyone”, police in Brazil have said. Thiago Rocha, 26, is accused of embarking on a killing spree in the central state of Goias, where he worked as a guard at a maternity and infant hospital. Following his arrest, Chief of Police Deusny Aparecido told a news conference Rocha was a “cold person” and “killed out of anger”.

He had no link to any of his victims and chose them at random. It could have been me, you or your children. He felt anger at everything and everyone.

Chief of Police Deusny Aparecido

Rocha, who is said to have confessed to the murders, was detained on Tuesday and is awaiting a court hearing. He reportedly tried to cut his wrists in his cell using a broken light bulb. The accused lives with his mother and had been picked up by police last year for stealing motorbike licence plates at a local supermarket. After his arrest this week he said he was feeling anguished and had committed the murders to ease his suffering. Images recorded on a snack bar CCTV helped police identify the alleged serial killer. Police say the first victim was 14-year-old Barbara Luiza Ribeiro Costa, who was killed in January this year. The latest victim was Ana Lidia Gomes, who was shot at a bus stop in a motorbike drive-by.