While you celebrate the World Cup, a Brazilian mother remembers her worst nightmare and calls for Justice

Ivo Alexandre Thome Rajão would be 18 years old today. The boy from São Gonçalo, Rio de Janeiro, was 14 when his body was found after being cruelly tortured on June 21st 2010. He went to the house of a friend to watch the match Brazil vs Ivory Coast, for the South Africa World Cup, and never returned home. Today, four years later, Angelica Ivo, mother of Alexander, asks for Justice in the case of the murder of her only male child, taken too early.

Crimes like this have made the U.S. and Chile adopt laws against homophobia and hate crimes based on sexual orientation. In the U.S. the Matthew Shepard (1976-1998) and Chile´s Daniel Zamudio (1987-2012) act was passed after a national commotion. In both cases the murders were solved, laws passed in the following years, the murderers convicted and sentenced exemplary, and the laws baptized with the name of the 22 and 23 years old victims. But, in Brazil, police identified the alleged killers but the case went cold after the judge in the case, Patricia Acioli, was killed in 2012. The Brazilian bill against homophobia, PLC 122, is over 16 years in Congress, it has been named Ivo Alexandre Act, but never advanced. The shocking murder of the 14 year old boy just did not thrill enough in a country where barbarians crimes and impunity are routine. Even the speech of Angelica did not sensitized Brazilian parliamentarians in Brasilia, which postponed the approval of the proposal to criminalize homophobia in the country. A repeated hate crime: Alexander was only another victim of homophobia in Brazil, which makes every 24h a new victim.

“Exactly four years ago I denounced to all the murder of my son Alexandre Thome Ivo Rajão aged 14, dead for what reasons? Hatred, homophobia and intolerance, plus what leads me to believe that the biggest reason was the cruelty of some individuals who can not be called HUMANS …  And today (21.06.14), if he was with us, Alexandre would be 18 years old of a fully living with our family, school life … Surely in a University, celebrating and getting together with friends to celebrate the joy of simply LIVE. My son, you will always live in our hearts, I love you, I fell so sorry for his physical missing presence… And what drives us today is to make sure that only the JUSTICE that will not fail is the God´s Justice and so we give continuity to our lives and you are with us in every moment. I Love you! ” wrote Alexandre´s  mother on Facebook this week, fourth anniversary of the death of Alexandre, also the Gay Pride week.

The boy was tortured “in all possible ways” and his body was found in shorts dropped into a wasteland. At the night before, a group of gay and lesbian friends of Alexander had a fight with another group of young people, relatives of the girl where they were watching the game, allegedly because one of the guys, friend of Ivo, had a not well seen gay relationship with the cousin of one of the killers. His gay friends went to the ER hospital because the fight and Alexander followed them. Then, while waiting for the bus to return home, Alexander, who was not part of the fight but would have been identified as a friend of the gay pack, was kidnapped, beaten and tortured. The mother found her son days after at the Coroner, and she says she can not tell that her son was gay because she believes that he was killed before he had a chance to live his sexuality, he never said anything about it to Angelica, but she emphasizes that the crime was motivated by homophobia, since the killers, during the party, have committed bullying and cursed the friend of her child which was associated with the gay group.

The men accused of committing this barbarism, then 22 to 23 years old, Eric Boa Hora de Bruim, Allan Siqueira de Freitas and Andre Luiz Marcoge da Cruz Souza, never faced a trial because a lack of criminal evidences and respond the accusation in freedom until now.

How many Alexandres need to be killed to Brazil realize that it is urgent to criminalize homophobia in the country? How many young people will need to die or kill themselves for attention to have the right of not to be underestimated, not be considerated as deserver of a painful death or inhuman treatment? How many mothers must cry and need to see the impunity of the death of their children because they were gay? No goals or World Cup titles can cure this mother’s pain, or bring back the Alexandre Ivo, just another young Brazilian with his right to live stolen.

Alexandre Ivo died cheering for the country at age 14, victim of homophobia. We hope that his death was not in vain. For us, and for the family of Alexandre, a World Cup will never be the same.