Trial in Brazilians' deaths begins

Prosecutors have one star witness in their case against the man accused of killing a family of Brazilian missionaries in Omaha.

His wife.

The wife of Valdeir Goncalves-Santos, 31, will describe how Goncalves admitted to her that he and two other men killed Vanderlei Szczepanik, quartered his body and dumped him over a bridge, said prosecutor John Alagaban, a deputy Douglas County attorney.

Prosecutors say subsequent conversations indicated that Szczepanik's wife, Jaqueline, and 7-year-old son, Christopher, met the same fate.

Outraged over her husband's actions, Goncalves' wife has traveled thousands of miles from a small coastal village in Brazil to testify against him, Alagaban said.

The wife's testimony is the primary evidence — defense attorneys call it the only evidence — in a case that will test prosecutors' ability to secure a conviction without the victims' bodies.

The first-degree murder trial, which began Tuesday in Douglas County District Court and is expected to last at least two weeks, is a tale of a family of Brazilian missionaries who vanished from Omaha just before Christmas 2009.

The Szczepaniks' Florida-based church had sent them to Omaha in 2004 to help turn the former Paul VI High School campus into a missionary center.

Szczepanik, who operated IGIT (In God I Trust) Construction, had hired one Brazilian worker, Jose "Carlos" Oliveira-Coutinho. Oliveira, in turn, had brought Goncalves and a third Brazilian to work for Szczepanik on the church-school, among other projects.

Those workers — fueled by greed and resentment — turned on their boss, plucking him and his family from their South Omaha home and killing them, prosecutors say.

Left behind in the church-school that doubled as the family's home at 1722 S. 16th St: A Christmas tree with ornaments, lights and children's slippers underneath. Legos scattered on the floor in front of the tree. The 7-year-old's coat hanging on a hook. His "Thomas the Tank Engine" comforter blanketing his bed. His wire-rim eyeglasses on a smiling train on the bed.

Also left behind: More than $100,000 in cash and uncashed checks — portions of which, defense lawyers suggest, Vanderlei Szczepanik and his workers obtained by bringing illegal immigrants to the United States.

Here's what wasn't left behind: Any sign that the family was still alive.

No sightings. No phone calls. No trace of little Christopher at school, on the bus or anywhere else. No financial transactions, other than those that police say were completed by Goncalves and the other workers suspected in the family's death.

And sweeps of the Missouri River — complete with sonar equipment — have failed to turn up any sign of the bodies.

Defense attorneys were quick to highlight what else was missing: No DNA evidence. Not even a trace of blood from the purported quartering of the bodies. No apparent crime scene.

In opening statements, defense lawyer Beau Finley questioned how likely it was that three people could be quartered and dumped in a river and have nothing turn up.

Finley turned his attention to the statements of Goncalves' wife, as well as the wife of Oliveira, who also is expected to testify.

Finley — who with Kevin Ryan is representing Goncalves — told jurors that the government has paid a substantial amount of money to relocate the wives to the United States.

He noted that Goncalves' wife told police that it's every Brazilian's dream to come to America. He questioned just how far she would go to fulfill that dream.

Finley also asked jurors to scrutinize any inconsistencies in the statements of both women.

Two detectives opened the state's case by tracing their investigation into the disappearance of the family.

After receiving a missing persons report from the pastor of the Szczepaniks' missionary church in Florida in early January, Omaha Police Sgt. Marlene Novotny and Officer Jeffrey Kozeny began a search.

Initially unsure if the family was missing or on a trip, they looked at both the former church where the family lived and the house at 524 Park Ave. where investigators now believe the family died.

On Jan. 10, 2010, Novotny said they were let into the church by Oliveira, one of the workers who would later be questioned.

Nothing in the house stirred. It was bone-cold inside — "colder than it felt outside," Novotny said. The detective studied a desk calendar and found nothing indicating the family had any vacations or trips planned.

Later, Kozeny studied phone records and determined that the last phone call between Vanderlei and Jaqueline Szczepanik was placed at 8:46 p.m. Dec. 17.

In time, financial records turned out to be equally revealing. Vanderlei Szczepanik's bank account was drained in the month after he was last seen. On Dec. 17, the account had more than $20,000 in it. By the end of January 2010, it had $1,000.

Seven times in that time period, someone withdrew $300 cash — the maximum amount allowed — from a Wells Fargo ATM near 24th and L Streets.

Though fuzzy, the surveillance photos from the ATM were telling: None of the Szczepaniks was pictured.

In late January, Kozeny retrieved video from a Council Bluffs Walmart where Szczepanik's card was last used.

His next phone call was to his bosses at Central Police Headquarters. The reason?

The photos "did not appear to be (of) Vanderlei, Jaqueline or Christopher," Kozeny testified. "There was obviously some concern that there may be some foul play. So we decided to get the homicide unit involved."

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