An initial analysis of Deise Moura’s phone showed she carried out internet searches for the word arsenic and other similar ones before the crime, Brazilian judicial officials said
The woman suspected of murdering three relatives and trying to kill another three with a poison-filled Christmas cake searched online for information about arsenic in the run-up to the horror crime, it has been claimed.
Brazilian judicial officials revealed that an initial analysis of Deise Moura’s phone showed “internet searches, including on Google Shopping, for the word arsenic and other similar ones.” The suspect, the daughter-in-law of Zeli dos Anjos, who baked the cake, is said to have carried out the searches in November as well as days before the victims died or fell ill.
Media reports in the South American country pointed to the evidence on Deise’s mobile phone being a key part of the case against her. Earlier, officials confirmed the source of the poisoning had been arsenic-laced flour in the cake the victims ate.
They said the toxic chemical was present in “extremely high concentrations” which were far too high to be naturally occurring and were enough to be fatal. Zeli, who had been in intensive care since being rushed to hospital in the early hours of December 24 along with five other relatives who ate the Christmas cake she made, has now been moved to a normal ward. She is expected to be interviewed by police in the coming hours.
Zeli’s teacher sister Maida Bernice Flores da Silva, 58, another sibling called Neuza Denize Silva Dos Anjos, 65, and Neuza’s daughter Tatiana Silvia Dos Santos, 43, died within hours of eating the cake late on December 23. Tatiana’s 10-year-old son Matheus, Zeli’s great nephew, was also taken into intensive care and only released from hospital last Friday.
Maida’s husband Jefferson was the other relative hospitalised along with Zeli, who ate two slices of cake and is said to have been exposed to more of the arsenic it contained. Margaret Mittman, Director of the Rio Grande do Sul General Forensic Institute which covers Torres, revealed tests on nearly 90 food samples had shown the source of the arsenic was flour.
She said: “We analysed 89 samples and of those 89 samples we found one sample of flour contained extremely high levels of arsenic. The level of arsenic in that flour reached the level of 65 grams per kilogram of flour which is around 2,700 times more than the concentration found in the cake.
“The flour was found during a search in the house where the cake was prepared. The forensic analysis that has been carried out shows the cause of death of the victims was arsenic poisoning and the source of that arsenic poisoning was the cake eaten by the victims and the source of the contamination of the cake was the flour found in Zeli’s house in Arroio do Sol.”
She said tests on the victims’ urine and blood samples as well as the contents of their stomachs had revealed “fatal levels” of arsenic up to 350 times higher than those which would be regarded as “naturally-occurring”. She added: “Extremely high levels of arsenic were found in the tests done on the three people who died.
“They were such high levels they were considered toxic and lethal. To give you an idea a permitted level of arsenic in urine which could be considered an occupational concentration would be around 35 micrograms per litre and in one of the three people who died with the lowest levels of arsenic it was about 80 times that and in the victim with the highest concentration it was 350 times higher.
“In other words it’s impossible that this amount of arsenic was what we could describe as occupational contamination. Very high levels of arsenic were also found in the cake consumed by the victims.
“They were so high once again that it’s impossible that we’re looking at natural-occurring contamination from the degradation of an ingredient used like currants. That arsenic was introduced into the cake and our tests show that it was introduced through the flour.”