In Rio do Sul, a city in the interior of just over 70 thousand inhabitants, he was simply called “França” and had not been seen by neighbors and acquaintances for at least two months.
França had decided to work with one of his sons in Barra Velha (SC), in a business involving elevator repairs, and was no longer seen in the neighborhood, today stunned by the attack in .
França, was seen by his colleagues as “good people” and part of a well-known family in the city and involved in commerce.
One of the brothers has a traditional musical instrument store in the center — his daughter, França’s niece, opened a real estate agency. This Thursday (14), the brother’s store was closed in the morning, unlike all other businesses in the region.
França was a locksmith, but he was also a nightclub owner, a business that closed in the wake of problems such as fights between patrons and the constantly called police.
But França was seen as a “calm person and willing to help”, in the description of Lourdes Fernandes, 62, one of the employees at a restaurant where he used to have lunch. “He was a normal person for us. He seemed like a good person. He offered help, helped. And his whole family is like that”, he says.
Close colleagues did not understand the attack in Brasília and did not even know that France was transiting through the country’s capital. They also didn’t pay attention to conversations about politics.
“I didn’t even remember that he had been a candidate anymore,” says Valdir Farias, 59, merchant. “He even talked about politics, but we gave little space to this subject. As we have commerce, it was better not to give space”, he reveals.
Farias knew France “from the old days, from the disco”. “We’re the same age. He was friendly, everyone got along with him. I don’t know how he did something like this. We’re in shock”, he says.
Farias has a car shop close to France’s last address in the city, in the Budag neighborhood, a region that suffered from floods at the end of 2023. “He was a little disoriented at the time, a little sad, he felt depressed. My business here too fic or underwater”, he recalls.
Another colleague, gardener Fernando Santos de Souza, 57, says that sometimes France “talked about saving the country.” “But he didn’t talk about politics, he was a calm person”, he says.
“A good person, like him, never insulted or humiliated anyone. I don’t know what got into him”, says the gardener.
but he received less than a hundred votes at the polls and was not elected. In 2024, he did not apply again.
President of the Rio do Sul PL since June 2023, Milton Goetten de Lima told Sheet who didn’t know France. “I know his family is good, well-known in the city. But I don’t have any additional information that I can add,” he says.
The PL candidate for Mayor of Rio do Sul, Manoel, won in the October polls.
Camila Regiane Santos, 30, who works with social media, states that “the vast majority here are right-wing, but they are peaceful people.” “Being right-wing, and being right-wing and doing what he did, is a huge difference. It was a surprise for everyone,” she says.
In the 2022 elections, Jair Bolsonaro (PL) was the candidate with the most votes in the city, in the second round of the dispute against Lula (PT) for the presidency of the Republic. Bolsonaro received 76.5% of the valid votes, against 23.5% for the PT member.
Residents watch with apprehension the developments of the episode in Brasília. They fear that the city is associated with terrorists.
“Today [14, quinta-feira] In the morning there was an uproar because the Federal Police were here. And that’s not common. This is a city without robberies, we leave the doors of our houses open”, says Camila.
“It’s scary. We really don’t know who our neighbor is,” he adds.
The Federal Police were at addresses linked to the perpetrator of the attack this Thursday morning.
One of the locations was a plot of land in the Budaq neighborhood, where there are two simple and apparently abandoned buildings. A small Brazilian flag glued to one of the external walls is among the remains. There are also panels indicating that there was a keychain there.
In the morning, France’s former teammate was at the scene. She told the PF that France’s plans included killing Minister Alexandre de Moraes, of the STF (Supreme Federal Court). The reporter, who was at the address in the afternoon, did not find the woman.
Neighbors report that she returned to the address after França went to Barra Velha, but that they have no contact with her. They also report that França had cut off the property’s electrical grid so that it would not be used, but the context is not clear.
Colleagues from France also say that he would have two children with his first wife — in addition to his son in Barra Velha, he also had a daughter who would live in another country. He also had a stepson, a teenager who helped him in the key trade and who would be the son of the woman found at the address in Budaq.
The reporter tried to speak to the children on this farm, but received no answers.
Before the attack, França said that the Federal Police would have to disarm the equipment.
“Let’s play??? Federal Police, you have 72 hours to defuse the bomb in the house of the shitty communists,” he said, in cell phone screenshots published on his Facebook page.
