Pedro Costa de Oliveira

Pedro Costa de Oliveira (1896–1967), better known as Pedro Palhaço (English: Pedro the Clown), was a Brazilian serial killer and rapist who murdered three women in Rio Grande do Sul from 1922 to 1952. Convicted and sentenced to 130 years imprisonment in total, he was considered one of the longest-serving inmates in the state, but his exact year of death is unknown.

Early life Pedro Costa de Oliveira was born sometime in 1896 in the city of Camaquã, the only child of a Brazilian, Florencio Ramos, and a Paraguayan mother, Maria José de Araujo. He left his parents' home at an early age to join a travelling circus where he worked as a clown, earning him the nickname "Pedro the Clown". In the early 1920s, he left the circus and found a job as a stoker's assistant for the Rio Grande do Sul State Railroad Company, settling in the city of Montenegro.

Murders Aracy Ferrão On August 28, 1922, Costa went to a local bar with his friend Afonso Pedro Borges, where they joined the company of 16-year-old Aracy Ferrão and Maria da Glória, both teens. Two days later, he was arrested and charged with Ferrão's murder.

When the trial concluded on January 19, 1923, Costa was found guilty on all counts and sentenced to 25 years and 6 months imprisonment, which he had to serve at a prison in Porto Alegre.

Rosalina Augusta Santana Costa remained incarcerated in the prison until about April 13, 1934, when he was assigned to perform community service outside the prison to help construct the Gravatai-Taqua Highway. Due to this, he was given a small house in Chácara das Bananeiras. Once they got there, Costa told her of his sexual fetishes, but when Santana refused to indulge in his fantasies, he grew angry and attacked her. While she viciously scratched him, Santana was overpowered and ultimately strangled to death. After killing her, Costa had sex with her corpse. Not long after, he was arrested and confessed to the crime. As a result, he was sentenced to an additional 21 years imprisonment and returned to the prison. On the night of Easter Sunday on April 13, 1952, he went drinking in several bars together with 43-year-old Universina Alves Maria de Almeida, a local saleswoman who peddled combs and other small objects. He eventually convinced her to have sex with him, and the pair agreed to go back to his house. Initially, it was believed that the body belonged to Costa, as he had been missing for a few days, but after it was removed, it was determined to belong to a woman. The police soon raided the house, finding dried bloodstains on the floor, bloodstained clothes and sheets, as well as numerous photographs depicting various people engaging in explicit sexual acts. It was established that Alves also had a criminal background - the daughter of a Brazilian father and Uruguayan mother and with a twin sister, she ran away from her home at age 13 to be with an older man.

Imprisonment and aftermath Due to the overwhelming amount of evidence against him, Costa was convicted and sentenced to 84 years imprisonment. He died at age 87 of cachexia in 1967, still serving time in the State Penitentiary.