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[line ringing]
[operator] Nine-one-one, what's your emergency?
[man 1] There's a burglar in this building!
Someone threw a kid from up there! Oh my God!
[operator] Threw a kid? From what height?
[man 1] From the sixth floor. They've thrown a kid!
There's a burglar in the building! Oh my God!
Good Lord!
[operator] Oh my God!
[man 1] Please, dear!
[operator] I'm just filling out…
[man 1] Can you hear me?
[operator] I can hear you. Help is on the way.
[tense music playing]
[man 2] The girl was found on the lawn.
The safety net on the window of Isabella's room
was cut with a knife and scissors.
[woman 1] All we could think of was,
"Oh my God, no! That's the love of our lives."
"They've thrown the love of our lives through a window."
Awaiting in expectation to hear Alexandre and Anna Carolina's statements.
[man 2] They were at the apartment.
The police are certain of that.
People saw their own loved ones in that victim.
JUSTICE BE DONE
I had never seen a case that moved public opinion this much.
They made a spectacle out of it.
What the fuck?
♪ Justice! Justice! ♪
[man 3] The jurors are led to believe the prosecution knows everything.
But that's not true in Isabella's case. We don't know everything.
It was atypical, a situation the police hadn't encountered before.
[man 4] The mom left the girl there alive.
When she went to pick her up, she was dead.
They fabricated a version of the facts to calm society.
Criminal materiality!
Who killed Isabella?
[woman 2] The perfect crime doesn't exist even if it's premeditated.
The lies started coming out.
[woman 3] Excuse us!
Our legal system wasn't ready for a case with such importance.
[woman 4] Then, the police started to investigate.
The news started to come out, and it was one surprise after another,
one shocking fact after another.
A LIFE TOO SHORT: THE ISABELLA NARDONI CASE
Look at this. So beautiful.
[woman 4] So many photos of you.
-Look, Gi. The two of you. -June festival.
I'm Isabella's cousin. Four months older than she was.
ISABELLA'S COUSIN
There we go.
We were inseparable.
Our parents had us when they were very young,
so we basically had each other.
I think I was much calmer than her.
She had a stronger personality.
She was more…
Agitated.
She was more agitated, exactly.
I was more laid back, I was calmer.
She fought for what she wanted, so to speak.
You used to be…
Yeah, I had an easier time taking things as they are.
I took a "no" better than her.
[heart beating]
[Ana] I was 17 when I got pregnant. I was still in school.
And it scared us.
-But my brother… -[Giovanna] My dad.
[Ana] …her father, conceived a few months earlier.
[Rosa] I was so happy to have a granddaughter.
Or a grandson. I didn't know.
Then we heard about Carolina.
That was different because Carolina was 17.
[gentle music playing]
ISABELLA'S FATHER
[Ana] We got divorced when she was 11 months old.
During the four years since then, we had our ups and downs.
In the beginning,
our relationship was like a typical relationship
between divorced parents.
We got along, but that got harder after he met Jatobá.
ISABELLA'S STEPMOTHER
We wouldn't talk much then.
But I could notice that she would act in a more mature manner
after she had her own kids.
[gentle music continues]
Isabella loved her siblings.
She really liked hanging out with them. She liked being around them.
For a mom who lets her kid spend the weekend at her dad's,
it's comforting to know that they enjoyed spending time with their siblings.
I wanted her to be a part of that.
They were a part of her life, so she had to experience that.
My last memory of her…
On that Friday, she went to her dad's.
MARCH 29TH, 2008 NORTH OF SÃO PAULO
[pensive music playing]
[Ana] When the accident happened,
my day had been pretty regular.
It was a Saturday. I was hanging out with my friends.
We were at a barbecue, and my phone rang.
"Mom, Isa was in an accident."
"What do you mean?" "She fell off the building."
"Where?" "At Alexandre's."
"She fell, she fell."
[man 5] It was so quiet that night.
You could hear the dew falling from the sky.
Then we started to hear a ruckus in the apartment next door.
[woman 6] When we went to bed, we heard a couple fighting.
It was a quick fight, about 15 to 20 minutes.
Then the silence was restored.
Right after that, we heard a person on the ground floor.
Yelling, "They tossed Isabella! Help! They tossed Isabella!"
I said, "Let's go downstairs and see if we can help."
I went towards Isabella. She was lying there on the grass.
There was a glass door close by. It was dark.
When I crouched to see if she had a pulse,
Alexandre Nardoni came out through the glass door.
He said, "There's someone in my apartment. He threw her out of the window."
He said that someone in his apartment had thrown the kid through the window.
And he said that this person was wearing a black shirt.
The doorman was wearing black.
[pensive music playing]
[man 6] We changed out of our pajamas and left.
It seemed like an eternity to get there.
Five minutes felt like five hours.
[Rosa] We were praying on our way there
because we couldn't even imagine what happened.
We had no idea what had happened.
[sirens wailing]
When we got there, there were lots of police officers.
My husband tried to go in by car, but the police didn't let us.
So I got out of the car and ran down the street.
I remember I got out of the car while it was still moving.
I opened the door and ran in.
When I got there, she was on the ground.
She was breathing very slowly.
[tender music playing]
I wasn't even worried about questioning what happened,
why it happened, or how it happened.
All I wanted was for her to get help as soon as possible.
So, I didn't leave her side, not even for a second.
I was comforted back then because she was still breathing.
Alexandre Alves, 29 years old,
arrived home with Isabella, his current wife,
his three-year-old daughter, and an 11-month-old baby.
They went in through this garage gate.
It was cold that night.
Right after he parked, according to other sources,
he took the six-year-old to the apartment that's on the sixth floor of the building.
The building is very safe.
Every balcony has safety nets, as you can see.
It's a brand-new building,
but a few minutes after that, according to other sources,
he came downstairs to pick up the other children,
and the girl was found right here, on the lawn.
[sirens wailing in the distance]
[Ana] I remember I tried to get in the ambulance.
I tried to stay by her side, but they didn't let me go in the back.
I went in the front.
I remember being inside the ambulance
and leaving the scene.
[tender music playing]
[Rosa] So when we got to the hospital,
as far as we knew, it was just an accident.
So I was there, I was hugging my daughter,
and then the doctor came to talk to us.
It wasn't long before they showed up to talk to us,
to tell us that she hadn't made it
and that we could go into the bedroom.
Unfortunately, it was very brief.
Very brief.
[Rosa] We all fell apart.
Carolina actually fell to the ground, sliding on the walls towards the ground.
So I went to my daughter, and I held her.
She looked at me and said, "Mom, why did this happen to me?"
I had no words.
What would I even say to my daughter? She'd just lost her daughter.
[gentle music playing]
After a while, I could only say,
"Sweetie, we need to let her go so she can move on."
When I finally realized she hadn't made it,
the only thing I could whisper into her ear was,
"You can go."
"Go in peace."
"I'll take care of everything on this end."
Those were my last words to her.
Then, the police started to investigate.
The news started to come out,
and it was one surprise after another, one shocking fact after another.
[siren wails]
POLICE
SÃO PAULO PD 9TH PRECINCT
We're here at 9th Precinct Station
in the north of São Paulo, and there's been a lot of movement.
Lots of reporters here throughout the afternoon and the evening
waiting in expectation to hear Alexandre and Carolina's statements.
I was on call when we received the news
that a child had fallen from their parents' apartment's window.
That's the first piece of information we'd gotten.
JOURNALIST AND WRITER
At first, everyone was unsure if it had been a crime,
a homicide, something of the sort,
or if it had been an accidental fall.
Back then, there was so much news of children who, when left alone,
had fatally fallen from windows.
ANOTHER CHILD FALLS OFF A WINDOW
CHILD FALLS OFF A WINDOW AND SUFFERS HEAD TRAUMA
CHILD FALLS OFF A WINDOW OF A BUILDING IN PERDIZES
They asked me to go to the 9th Precinct Station,
and I got information during a collective interview
with Officer Calixto Calil Filho.
There was a suspicion, including the family, of a homicide.
A five-year-old child around 11:30 p.m. last night
was thrown from the sixth floor of a building.
It wasn't an accident.
Somebody cut the window's safety net and threw her from there.
It's impossible for a five-year-old
to cut the net and throw herself at that time of night.
According to the dad,
she was sleeping when she got to the apartment.
She was already sleepy. She had already slept on the father's lap.
So, there's a possibility of homicide,
because someone cut the safety net and threw her out the window.
[pensive music playing]
Really, at that point, I thought it had been an accident,
whatever it was that happened.
But then they told us we had to go to the police station.
What was I supposed to do at the police station?
What do you mean, the police station? Come on!
So we still have to go through all this? It was an accident.
9TH PRECINCT
[woman 7] I was on call that Saturday night.
My shift had started at eight p.m., and right after that, at 12 a.m.,
a state police officer told me about the case.
At first, he said, "There was a burglar in a building,
and during his break-in, a child was thrown from the sixth floor."
[pensive music playing]
The police request a deposition from the father and the stepmother.
[man 2] The police asked them if they'd ever received any threats,
if they had enemies,
if someone wanted to hurt them or the child.
[Renata] They talked so much about the doorman,
so I started looking into his entire life,
researching his background, finding out who he was.
Especially because of how suspicious the couple was towards him.
[man 7] I called one of the members of the board of residents immediately.
He was one of the building's first residents.
I told him a girl had fallen.
At first, I thought she had fallen off a balcony.
I didn't know back then.
I told him to call an ambulance and the police.
[man 4] What he did is exactly what anyone else would've done
in that situation.
He called the building manager,
and the building manager went there and confirmed it was true.
[Renata] When I got to the scene, it was very crowded.
There were a lot of civilians, state police officers.
So I assessed the apartment.
Right off the bat, I noticed there were no signs of break-in.
Then I walked into the living room, and I noticed some drops of blood.
So I had already found my first answer.
Something had happened in the apartment
before the victim had been thrown out the window.
It was clear something had happened.
And, at that point, I couldn't be sure the blood was Isabella's.
I hadn't even seen her body,
so I still didn't know who bled in the apartment and why.
Our job is to assess the scene more carefully,
to look for other blood spills,
or any other residues compatible to our forensic assessment.
Even after a few days?
The house was messy,
but it wasn't anything out of the ordinary.
The people who lived there were just messy.
Nothing was broken.
It's not like everything was out of its place
like we typically see in cases of homicide.
It wasn't like a typical homicide or break-in mess.
It was a regular mess.
[Renata] That evidence pointed to the fact that it wasn't a burglar who did this.
It wasn't a break-in, it was a homicide.
There was blood on the scene, and there was no evidence of burglary.
The place wasn't turned upside down.
Also, there was no evidence of a fight,
of someone trying to escape, or even of a fight between the couple.
[Rodrigo] We were informed he is the child's father.
He's giving a statement,
ISABELLA'S FATHER
and here's an exclusive look at it.
[Renata] As they were making their statement, I would ask them,
"Is that possible? Why would a burglar throw a child out the window?"
I'd ask them these questions
so we could reach a more plausible hypothesis
of what could've happened in the apartment.
[Rodrigo] You are watching this exclusive scene.
Anna Carolina, the stepmother, a young woman.
She seems to be scared.
Her face is tense.
GIRL DIES AFTER FALLING
[man 8] At first, it was just an ordinary case.
On the very first day, the newspapers didn't highlight this case that much.
It started gaining attention over time.
[pensive music playing]
[Ana] On Sunday, I left home.
I was on my way to the funeral, and some TV channel called me.
For an average family like mine, tragedies like this only happen on TV.
Suddenly, I was on TV. It was my family on TV.
MARCH 30TH, 2008
It's knowing that my daughter didn't get a chance to read,
to write, to study…
to turn 15,
to have dreams, to go to college.
She just didn't.
We gotta be there for each other.
Sometimes we lose our strength, but we try to be there for each other.
FOREVER OUR LITTLE STAR
[man 9] We're talking about a crime against a child,
and that kind of crime moves people.
It happened to a middle-class family.
The context of the crime caught people's eyes.
Thank you.
[reporter 1] We studied together, fourth grade.
We support you.
I couldn't leave my house.
Because TV reporters, radio reporters, or newspaper journalists
would stand in front of my house like they were on call.
Day and night.
Sorry, I understand where you're coming from,
but I'd rather be left alone.
They said the girl fell off the building,
but an experienced policeman gets there and says it wasn't like that.
Right, Officer Calil?
[Calixto] We're facing a complex case here.
We're being extremely cautious.
We're checking every single piece of information that gets to us,
anyone who was mentioned,
anyone who saw someone doing something in the building.
[pensive music playing]
[woman 8] The on-call forensic officer got there first.
As soon as he noticed that something was off,
he reached out to me.
I was informed it was a burglary that ended up in death.
So I went there and assessed the scene.
"Okay, so what happened here?"
"What happened is the parents left her in the apartment sleeping,
then went to get the other two, who were in the car."
"When they came back, she was there."
"She was defenestrated. She was thrown out of the window."
"She was lying right next to the doorman's post."
"Was she harmed?" "No, they said she wasn't harmed."
Okay, but if she wasn't harmed,
why is there blood by the apartment's entrance?
That bloodstain was at the doorstep,
which indicates that it had been produced from the outside in.
This is something that caught my attention.
This can't be ignored.
The girl was hurt outside of the apartment.
[pensive music playing]
[Sergio] There was a lot of laundry to be done
on the washing tub and on the washing machine,
but I noticed a bucket with a cloth inside.
It looked like a cloth diaper.
It was sunken in water,
so I thought, "There's so much stuff here, and just this one bucket?"
"Let's take that."
What happened? Blood.
There was blood on the diaper.
FORENSIC POLICE
[man 10] The first contact we had with the case
happened very early in the morning.
We got a phone call from the morgue's front desk
telling us there was a civil police officer
who wanted to ask us some questions about a case.
CORONER
The officer wanted to know if there were any wounds of the body
that would be enough to cause the blood spills found on the scene.
In fact, she did have a wound on her forehead.
It was caused by a pointy object of some sort.
It left a small wound on her forehead.
Her face was blueish, her nails too.
She had some marks on her neck that indicated that someone squeezed it.
-Clear signs of asphyxiation. -[dramatic sting]
INSTITUTE OF FORENSIC MEDICINE
[man 4] Her death was caused by multiple traumas
and mechanical asphyxiation from choking.
When she fell, she didn't die immediately. She was alive for some time.
She was hurt.
She was going through a serious asphyxiation process
that ended up killing her.
There were several signs on the body
indicating she had been choked before being defenestrated.
POLICE
[Renata] When Alexandre talked to me, he started by asking,
"Did you catch the burglar?"
[sirens wailing]
[Francisco] Over 30 officers were called to duty that night
because a burglar had broken into the apartment
and thrown the girl out of the window.
Naturally, the police set the perimeter on the block
and canvassed the surroundings to find the supposed aggressor.
No personal belongings were missing, there was no evidence of a break-in,
there was no report of any other person being seen in the building
or going down the elevator.
[sirens continue wailing]
[Rosa] When we got to the hospital, Alexandre came to talk to me.
He said, "Rosa, she was so happy,
and then the burglar just tossed her from up there."
"What are you talking about?"
"When I got there, the door was broken down."
"What do you mean? Why would he toss her from up there?"
He was acting like a caged lion, going from one side to the other.
"I saw the burglar. He was wearing black. He broke the door down. I saw it."
I was like, "Well, look at your size. Why didn't you fight him, damn it?"
"Why didn't you fight him?" Then he changed the subject.
POLICE
[Renata] They had the same train of thought.
It was like they rehearsed it.
She noticed the story the couple was telling was pretty odd
because the sequence of facts they were telling
did not match what the witnesses' had already told her.
He was more worried about adding someone to the crime scene
and blaming this person for his daughter's death
than actually solving the crime.
He didn't have questions, he had information,
and he tried to convince me it was true.
I thought it was odd.
[Rodrigo] She just realized that the press is here.
Her attorney is trying to hide her.
She's leaving the room now.
But we've already gotten some images.
[reporter 2] What happened if they arrived together from the grandmother's house?
That will be determined by the police. The police are doing their job.
We're here to assist during interrogations.
We can't say who did this.
[Francisco] The couple first went to the police station
with a team of attorneys right off the bat.
They had already prepared a power of attorney document
to defend the couple.
It caught our attention at the time.
[Rogério] In cases that grab the media's attention,
those cases where a crowd of reporters comes along,
behind the crowd of reporters and the cameras
there's always a group of civilians screaming,
"Murderer! Justice!"
So I remember hearing a female voice.
"Murderer! Murderer!"
So I look around, and I thought, "Civilian at this hour? Really?"
But it wasn't a civilian, it was the precinct's chief on call.
She was yelling at them.
In no instance did I see this precinct chief saying that.
And I didn't have the time to be up to speed with what was happening
in the surroundings of the investigation.
[Rodrigo] Notice the crowd. Alexandre and Anna Carolina are coming.
Lots of people. No pushing!
[police] Excuse us! Don't block the car door!
Don't block it!
[Rodrigo] This is a ruckus. Don't push me.
Get a shot of the car!
Check this out. We're right in front of the car.
Alexandre and Anna Carolina are coming out.
Look over here! Get back here!
Alexandre's coming out over here!
-[clamoring] -[camera shutters clicking]
At first, Ana Carolina de Oliveira didn't point fingers at anybody.
MOTHER AND GRANDFATHER DEFEND FATHER AND STEPMOTHER
I had no reason to doubt them.
My family didn't even think about it.
I didn't think about it.
People would say, "He did it! He did it!"
We'd say, "No."
"Sure, he can be cold sometimes or whatever,
but he would never murder his little girl
because he loved Isa, and Isa loved him."
[woman 2] If I were the girl's mother,
the girl's grandmother,
I'd be on my knees praying for it to be another person.
CRIMINOLOGIST
I wouldn't even imagine the girl's father could be involved in such a story.
[reporter 3] The adjunct police chief arrived with the couple's attorneys.
She didn't disclose what was discussed.
She assured it wasn't an official statement.
I can't disclose anything.
-[reporter 4] Is it confidential? -Yes, it's confidential.
Investigating a crime in which the suspect is close to the victim is a delicate task.
It takes three times as much responsibilities.
There's no room for mistakes.
You can't mistakenly charge a father, or a mother,
or anyone who's close to the victim.
If that person turns out to be innocent, they're a victim too, they're hurting.
We can't make the mistake of accusing a father
of killing his own daughter without being absolutely sure.
[Renata] What I can reveal is that,
after having gathered evidence on the crime scene,
we can visualize about 70% of what happened that day.
[Renata] After two or three days of investigation,
I had enough evidence to tell that they were lying.
And if that man was capable of throwing his own daughter out of the window,
then he's capable of running away, of anything.
POLICE
[man 11] Please understand this is a very serious crime
involving truly arduous work.
Officer Renata is fully dedicated to this case
and working on it exclusively.
She barely even slept these past three days,
so we won't take on the demand of closing the case
earlier than the 30 days determined by law.
When everything happened, I called Officer Renata.
POLICE CHIEF
And she said, "Sir, I'm sure of it."
"The couple did it."
[dramatic music playing]
[reporter 5] The police issued a warrant for the temporary arrest
of Isabella's father and stepmother.
[Rogério] People are screaming, "Murderer."
He looks scared. He's leaving right now.
Look, this is Alexandre.
Alexandre, are you innocent?
I'm innocent.
Why is this happening, Alexandre?
Alexandre says he's innocent.
The officers are protecting him.
This is a ruckus. People are still yelling, "Murderer."
Alexandre is heading out while being protected by police officers.
He's trying to get into the building.
It's wild here.
People are chasing him. He's running around the precinct.
Here… He's going in.
[Marcelo] I'd say the case went down a very risky path.
If they never found enough technical evidence
that could confirm the suspicion that the police had since the beginning,
then the case would turn into a scandal.
[woman 9] Sometimes, even in the beginning of an investigation,
the outcome is already decided.
But before reaching a conclusion,
first, you need to assess all elements found by the police chief
during the whole course of the investigation.
That's a premise that cannot be abandoned when you're building an investigation.
The press needs to be fast. It needs to be swift.
It works in an immediate fashion.
So when a crime happens,
ideally, they'd like to present the guilty party right away.
When justice tries to keep up with the press,
be that during the investigation, be that during the trial,
things get messy.
[Francisco] I must abide by the Brazilian legislation.
It establishes how the parties may gather evidence,
and, so far, the evidence incriminates the defendants.
A few days after the crime,
during my first interview with a reporter,
he asked me, "How many years do you expect the defendant to face?"
And I answered him,
"Sir, we haven't even finished the investigation yet."
"We're not sure if charges will be pressed,
if there will be a trial, a jury, and if they'll be convicted,
but you're already asking me how long their sentence will be?"
-[dramatic sting] -[dramatic music playing]
TO THE POLICE, THERE ARE NO DOUBTS: THEY DID IT
[man 12] A weekly paper published an article saying, "They did it."
That's basically a condemnation. That's a sentence.
For the Nardoni case…
Just five years old…
Alexandre and Anna Carolina will testify in court…
The mom, after all she went through during the investigation…
People were talking about the crime everywhere and all the time.
At the bakery, at bars… People would talk about that.
♪ Justice! Justice! ♪
Isabella was thrown from the sixth floor.
Justice. They can't get away with it.
People were watching it as if it was a soap opera.
Ladies, do you really think when a five-year-old gets scared
they're patient enough to grab a pair of scissors,
a five-year-old girl,
cut the safety net and jump?
[high-pitched whistle]
What the fuck?
[Ana] My life turned upside down.
Information would come to light, new facts would come to light,
and I was just, "What's going on?"
[reporter 6] This is exclusive.
Our images show Isabella's last moments inside the supermarket.
You'll see everything that happened inside that store.
These are unreleased images.
LOUSY ACTORS
MONSTER PARENTS
Murderers! Murderers!
[man 13] People crave tragedies.
They've been…
PRIVATE EXPERT
…yearning for tragedy since Greek times.
Could Anna Carolina Jatobá and Alexandre Nardoni leave the country?
♪ Justice! Justice! ♪
Who killed Isabella?
[Rosa] It was just blown out of proportion.
We couldn't believe how huge it became.
It was on TV 24/7.
All day every day, I was on TV.
[reporter 7] Over the weekend,
three witnesses residing in the building where the crime occurred
provided their deposition regarding Isabella's death
to the investigation.
[Rogério] I spoke with a nurse
who mentioned hearing noises emanating from a nearby building under construction
which would serve as the perfect escape route.
I talked to the construction workers,
JOURNALIST AND WRITER
and I asked if they had seen anything odd.
They said they didn't, but someone slept there during the week,
so maybe they would know something.
[man 15] The foreman confirmed the information on the phone
with the first worker to arrive on Sunday.
Hi, Gabriel.
FOREMAN
Listen, was there a break-in here last Sunday?
Oh, so it was open?
No one took anything, but they opened the place?
[Gabriel] It was open.
He told me that when he got there in the morning on Sunday,
he noticed that the gate had been broken into.
This OSB wood sheet was broken.
It was supposed to be nailed to the structure as the other ones.
They're all nailed together,
but this was broken, so someone could've passed through.
Nothing was taken,
but the foreman shows us how easy it is to access the building.
He said, "I could tell someone went through our stuff."
"I knew that someone had broken in."
[reporter 8] Were you there that night, Gabriel?
I wasn't there.
I'm not there on weekends.
What did the civil police do?
That article had just been published, and the police were about to decide
if they were going to release the couple or not.
But right then,
they took that construction worker to the police station.
He arrived at the station, he met with the police officers,
and chances are he was pressured to change his story.
Then they took him to the reporters and he said, "I didn't say anything."
"The gate wasn't broken. It never happened."
I know nothing. I know nothing about a break-in.
-[press 1] Were you working at that time? -No.
-Did a burglar break in? -No.
-Did you give an interview? -No.
-No? -No.
What did you say?
Nothing was stolen, and nobody broke in.
-So nobody broke in? -No.
-No? -No.
[Rogério] The problem was that the police did not investigate this lead.
If they had investigated,
they would have found the person who broke in.
It was Sergeant Messias and two other police officers.
Over 30 police officers drove over to the scene,
and they canvassed the area as they usually do.
And why didn't the police have information
about the break-in at that place on that night?
Because the sergeant failed to include it in his report.
So what's the easy way out?
You pressure an illiterate person, a scared person,
and say, "Look, from now on, you deny it until the end."
And he denied it until the end.
JUSTICE TO DECIDE TODAY ON RELEASE OF FATHER AND STEPMOTHER
APPELLATE JUDGE WILL MAKE A RULING ON THE DEFENSE'S HABEAS CORPUS MOTION
JUDGE SAYS DETENTION CANNOT BE BASED ON SUSPICIONS ALONE
At 2:30 p.m., after a week, Alexandre gets out of jail.
[clamoring]
[woman 8] Murderer!
I just have to thank God.
-[siren wailing] -[tires screech]
[man 14] We were called to escort the couple to the police station
where they'd be released.
That was where I first met them.
What surprised me was that they started laughing.
They started talking as if nothing had happened.
I even asked him,
"Why are you laughing? Your daughter is dead."
The couple will be relocated to a safe place
as they pose no risk or danger.
[siren wails]
APRIL 18TH, 2008
[Robinson] You had to be there to see it.
The day the couple gave their statement at the station,
the place was filled with reporters, cameramen, photographers,
even helicopters.
[Rogério] They also did something I had never seen before.
They scheduled the couple’s interrogation on April 18th,
which would've been the victim's sixth birthday.
♪ Happy birthday to you ♪
[Renata] I scheduled the interrogation on the same date as Isabella's birthday
purely by coincidence.
Anyone assuming it was intentional is mistaken.
It was not intentional.
It was a strategy.
CHIEF OF SPECIAL OPS
I'm assuming they did that to appeal to people emotionally.
Like an interrogation technique.
Very common stuff.
Have you ever heard of "Good cop, bad cop"?
Even kids know about this sort of thing.
It wasn't something done under wraps.
They released this information.
They even installed portable toilets in front of the police station
so that the crowd could be there
and somehow put pressure on the couple for them to confess.
[Marco] I know they were in there for over 20 hours,
and they didn't confess.
During the interrogation, Alexandre Nardoni and Anna Carolina Jatobá
denied their involvement in Isabella's death.
The timetables mentioned by the couple
and the details of their arrival to the building on March 29th
do not match the statements given by other witnesses
nor the collected forensic evidence.
Alexandre Jatobá,
father of Isabella's stepmother Anna Carolina,
does not question the couple's innocence.
She said, "I can't believe this is happening to me, Dad."
I said, "Be strong."
"Everyone goes through hardship in life,
but right now, we need to prove your innocence."
[press 2] What's your greatest fear right now?
[man 15] I don't fear anything right now.
I'm confident. I'm sure they didn't do it.
I'll do everything in my power to prove it.
[reporter 9] What if the investigators are able to prove that they did it?
I don't know what they'll say.
Every day someone says there's been a new decision
or that they have news,
so we just have to wait.
We can't speculate.
[Renata] I feel like Alexandre's father's behavior,
his family's behavior helped a lot,
because they were on the news a lot.
They wanted to be on the news a lot.
And maybe people would see them and think,
"Looks like they're powerful people, so they'll get away with it."
I'd hear that a lot from other people.
"Is this going to work? Will they be arrested? They're rich."
[reporter 10] Antonio Nardoni is not only a father and grandfather,
but also a defense attorney.
As a tax attorney, he's always calm and composed.
He appears to be instrumental in the defendant's decisions.
[Renata] There was something about Alexandre.
The look on his face, the way he kept his head up.
Something about him was arrogant.
He gave me the impression that he was thinking,
"No matter what you do, my dad is going to fix it."
"I'm safe. My dad's got my back."
Despite his age, he didn't act like an adult.
His dad handled everything for him.
His matters, his conflicts, the couple's fight.
Even his apartment.
Nothing was bought with his own money because he couldn't afford it.
Even the decoration choices were made by the father.
Nothing was his. Everything was his family's.
He could treat himself to all of it as long as he behaves.
[pensive music playing]
Alexandre knew absolutely nothing about Isabella's daily routine.
He didn't know her teacher's name, her pediatrician's name.
He paid child support because the court ordered it.
So when you look at this child's father, Alexandre Nardoni,
he has a history of recurrent failures,
recurrent attempts of being the perfect son
for that family followed by failure.
He had a history of aggression,
even towards his wife, and even towards Isabella's mother.
He got more aggressive over time.
[reporter 11] Talk to us! Talk to the press.
[reporter 12] How are your kids?
I remember there was a complaint made by Anna Carolina Oliveira.
ALEXANDRE ALVES NARDONI ANA CAROLINA CUNHA DE OLIVEIRA
She filed that against him,
claiming he had threatened her when Isabella was 16 months old
because she enrolled Isabella at a school without his consent.
We had to go to the police station and file a complaint
because he used to threaten me.
He wanted to kill me.
Yeah. He said he was going to kill me.
DRIVER'S LICENSE NAME: ALEXANDRE ALVES NARDONI
Maybe he would sometimes spank their children or something,
but nothing out of the ordinary.
Especially with Isabella. He never did anything.
Even her mother confirms this, so…
What's lacking in the media coverage?
This couple's version of the facts.
Who doesn't remember that notorious interview
with the Nardoni couple for the Fantástico TV show?
It was the most watched TV show at the time.
[Robinson] We went to Antonio Nardoni and said,
"We want to interview the couple."
Later that night, he called us and said,
"Okay, they'll do it. They'll give you an interview."
It was huge.
That was very big.
APRIL 20TH, 2008
[man 16] You're being accused of a serious crime.
How are you handling it?
[Rogério] It was disastrous.
They messed up the interview because they weren't skilled speakers.
They didn't have any experience with these kinds of interviews.
And the reporter took advantage of that.
How do you feel about Isabella's tragic death?
We're suffering.
It all hurts us,
what people are saying about us,
their judgement of us, because they've sentenced us themselves
even though we're absolutely innocent.
[man 16] Right.
Yes, we are a family, my wife Anna Carolina and I.
How can I put this?
We're a family like any other, you know?
We are all about family, and we're united as a family.
[Rosa] If any of us were still unsure,
that interview on Fantastico put our doubts to rest.
We were absolutely sure.
[Ilana] Her cry was childish and ridiculous.
She was pretending to cry. It's not even childish.
There were no tears.
"We were a family. We were a family. We were a family."
Right. I've got a family too.
There are so many families out there
who stab each other in the back.
There was another thing that caught people's attention,
those who watched the interview.
Whenever Alexandre tried to speak,
the stepmother would talk over him.
He couldn't finish his sentences.
They don't know who we really are.
I mean…
They know us through what they see in the media,
but most of what they're saying about us was made up.
Nobody knows our family for real.
Nobody knows who we truly are.
After that interview on Fantástico,
many people hastily drew the conclusion that Jatobá was the leader of the couple.
But this thesis does not hold under deeper assessment.
She was the one being abused.
She talks more, she's nervous, she's anxious. She's not in charge.
[Ilana] Another important detail on Anna Carolina Jatobá's history
is that she was clearly struggling with depression.
Postpartum depression.
She was seriously depressed. Her boy was eleven months old.
[Ilana] That mess represents her mental state.
Her house is like a picture of her mind.
She's not okay.
She was hurting, she was suffering.
Who said that she was happy?
Were they holding hands at the supermarket? Sure.
But she was isolated from all her friends.
She never hung out with any friends, she never got any calls.
You couldn't find a single friend of hers.
[pensive music playing]
[Marcelo] Let's consider the hypothesis that we're dealing with a normal couple,
who aren't violent, cruel people.
At some point, someone lost their temper and assaulted the child.
Let's assume for a second that this assault wasn't meant to kill.
Let's assume that, even though it wasn't planned,
it ended up happening.
This is not just about the mistakes that were made anymore.
This is about a wicked person
who committed a crime and tried to hide it.
I don't know what really happened in there.
[pensive music playing]
[doorknob clicks]
At this crime scene,
what immediately called my attention were the bloodstains.
For two reasons.
First, because of their morphology.
I also noticed that they tried to remove them.
They tried to clean the bloodstains,
but they were perfectly visible.
The bloodstains marked a path from the door to the couch.
The bloodstains that were right in front of the door told us something.
Because of the height of their projection,
we could tell Isabella was carried into the apartment.
She didn't come here walking by herself.
The drops matched the stride of an adult.
We can also tell the height of the person carrying her
by the way the blood drops were projected,
which matches the father's height.
Let's assume Anna, making a huge effort, was carrying the kid.
The bloodstains would have had another morphology,
that of a shorter height.
Here, right by the couch,
there were several other bloodstains,
other than those I'd seen coming from the door.
If you followed the path drawn by the bloodstains,
you would be led straight into the bedroom where the children used to sleep in.
The bed wasn't made. There were blood drops here as well.
The last bloodstain we found in this apartment
was on the windowsill.
[Sergio] There were a lot of dirty dishes in the sink,
but I still noticed a pair of scissors.
And I thought,
"This object could have been used to cut the safety net."
We found, trapped within the scissors,
a part of the safety net.
[Ilana] There were many toys on the bed.
Plus, the bed was made.
Other than that, there was a drawing Isabella did on the bed.
Therefore, there's no way the father placed her on the bed.
The fact that he said that bothered me deeply.
Why was the father lying?
FORENSIC POLICE
[dramatic music playing]
FORENSIC POLICE
[Francisco] The defendants were subpoenaed,
invited to take part in a reenactment
that happened on Sunday morning, April 27th, 2008.
The forensic team was going to reenact, to a T,
the version the defendants thought would benefit them.
They refused to go.
They said they wouldn't produce evidence against themselves.
APRIL 27TH, 2008
[dramatic music playing]
The police chief formally requested that Judge Maurício
prohibit any aircrafts from flying within a 1.2 mile perimeter.
But the press came up with a workaround.
They rented the surrounding apartments,
and they put the reporters and commentators on the balconies
with powerful cameras so they could film the forensic team.
For almost three hours,
a team of ten professionals have been in the building
where the crime happened on March 29th.
With the simulation, we established the timing of the events.
We drew out a timeline, which was extremely important.
We searched for any previously unknown pieces of information
since the beginning of the investigation.
For example, the car had a GPS device.
We were able to pinpoint the exact moment the car was turned off.
Everything happened after 11:36 p.m. that night.
11:36 P.M.
They went upstairs. They got into the apartment.
All of that happened in 15 minutes. It all took place within that timeframe.
At 11:49 p.m., the doorman heard a noise.
He said it sounded like a car crash.
[dramatic sting]
11:49 P.M.
Immediately, he goes out and calls the building manager.
The manager desperately calls the police.
We also know exactly when they answered that call.
11:50 p.m.
11:50 P.M.
We have the recording of the manager's talk with the police responder.
[manager] There's a burglar in this building!
Someone threw a kid from up there! Oh my God!
[Francisco] We were able to use that recording
to identify the exact moment
in which the defendant arrives to check the body.
It happened at 11:50 p.m. and a few seconds.
That means that one minute after Isabella had been thrown from up there,
the defendant was right next to her body.
While all of this is happening, Anna is in the apartment making calls.
The first person Anna called was her father.
The call was super fast, it took seconds.
Then, after another six seconds, she calls her father-in-law.
It was also a quick talk.
While she was on the phone, Isabella was already down there.
She was on the phone with her father and then her father-in-law
during the exact timeframe that Lucio, the building manager,
was on the phone with the police.
And she was upstairs on the phone.
I mean, if there was a third person, then that person would be with them.
They said they went back to the car.
The girl was asleep,
so they went back to the car to get the other children,
then they went up to the apartment.
It was only upon entering the apartment that they realized Isabella was missing.
The account provided by the defendant would suggest
that he reached the ground floor after midnight.
That simulation was essential for the timeline to be established.
There's no way.
[reporter 13] Alexandre Nardoni and Anna Carolina Jatobá are handcuffed.
Their preventative arrest was ordered this Wednesday.
Right now, at 10:33 p.m.,
the couple will be taken to the 9th Precinct police station.
Alexandre Nardoni is being placed in a police car.
There's Alexandre. He's in the back of the car.
There he is. They're taking him. That car over there.
Anna Carolina Jatobá is being taken in that car.
[Mario] We received an order to go to the building.
We took them with us, and the crowd applauded.
Our job was basically attending them so they weren't lynched.
[reporter 14] Their arrival at the police station was also hectic.
As well as reporters,
curious civilians wanted to see the couple.
[clamoring]
[reporter 15] Move! Move! Go to the other side!
Very soon after the judge came to his decision,
several news media outlets were aware of what was going on.
The officers who apprehended the couple
removed the window tint from the rear part of the car,
where the prisoners are usually seated.
It was all intentional, of course.
They even told the reporters and camera crew,
"Look, we got a little gift."
[camera shutters click]
[sirens wailing]
And to top it off, after they got to the police station,
they had to wait inside the car,
both of them.
With the door wide open,
so everyone could film them and take photos of them,
as if they were a couple of awards,
a couple hunting prizes the police had put down.
[camera shutters clicking]
[man 17] I'm recording. Sir, say something, damn it!
[police] All right, stop it. That's enough.
[man 17] I thought you were gone, bro. Come on!
[police] Excuse me! Careful! Hey, watch your head! Watch your head!
[Mario] The police cannot stop the press from doing their jobs.
And the truth is, there was no point in rushing any of it.
They were arrested, they were safe.
We had them under our protection.
There was no reason to hurry just to keep the press from getting good shots of them.
If the press filmed them, it's their business.
COUPLE SURRENDERS BEFORE ENRAGED CROWD
THE JUDGE ACCEPTED THE CHARGES AND ISSUED AN ARREST WARRANT AROUND 6 P.M.
[Robinson] The press seeks the scoop.
And in the heat of the moment, they may sometimes
inadvertently turn a situation into a spectacle,
striving to be the first with breaking news
and outpace their competitors.
Does this stem from bad faith?
I couldn't tell you for sure it's bad faith.
All I know is that this case moved the entire country.
It was almost like society went through a catharsis over this case.
[Flávia] This case, without a doubt,
symbolizes the complex relationship between media and criminal justice.
It's history.
It's important to remember that during the inquisition,
crowds would gather at squares to witness public executions.
There was a sense of satisfaction among people,
driven by a perceived notion of justice, regardless of who was being accused
or what evidence led to those executions.
People have shown a great sense of interest
in criminal justice throughout history.
[Ricardo] This crime happened within the middle-class,
which is a class of great influence in public opinion.
So, in a way, the middle-class audience,
which is the great public,
can picture themselves in that same situation,
one way or another.
"I see myself in that apartment."
"For some reason, I covet that case."
"I want to know more about it."
So it's the perfect case to get a major audience.
Some press channels actually went over the top.
They completely lost sight of their responsibility.
How can they analyze the tone of her voice
without ministering a lie detector test?
To produce a news story using a lie detector…
I don't agree with that.
We're suffering. It all hurts us.
What people are saying about us,
their judgement of us, because they've sentenced us themselves
even though we're absolutely innocent.
LIE
I didn't produce that story, and I wouldn't have done that.
I don't agree with that.
[upbeat music playing]
SUPER POP WITH LUCIANA GIMENEZ
Francisco Cembranelli, thank you so much for this interview.
Thank you, it's my pleasure to be here.
[Robinson] Cembranelli was considered a national hero.
-How are you? -Great. Nice to meet you.
What should I call you? Francisco, Chico, or Cembranelli?
Everybody calls me Cembranelli.
[host] Cembranelli.
Let's start from the beginning,
-and not when you were born. -Oh, yeah.
District Attorney Francisco Cembranelli became famous working on cases
that moved public opinion.
You became a superstar during the Nardoni case.
Did that affect you personally?
Were you harassed? Your family, your children?
What harassment did you go through?
People talk to me on the streets.
I don't know how to handle it because I'm shy.
I'm not a celebrity.
I'm still doing my same old job in the same place as always.
If I'm being completely honest, I was ready to form a jury.
In 2008, three months after the fact.
I used to say that to any journalists who asked me,
"What will it take for the prosecution to take this to a jury?"
I would answer, "Nothing. The judge just needs to order it,
and we'll call in a jury with the evidence collected."
"It's enough to convict them."
The prosecution wants to take advantage of all the clamoring
because it's easier to get the answer
while the public is affecting the pace of the trial
and the investigation.
[birds chirping]
[gentle music playing]
[Ana] People would send me their pictures attached to their letters
showing me their sympathies.
I would notice the magnitude of this whole thing
when I received these moving letters
that described how people interpreted and embraced the story.
Some people named their daughters "Isabella" because of this.
Anyway, these letters really moved me.
Look.
"You don't know me. I'm Rosana, I'm forty-seven years old,
and I'm a mother of three."
"Since March 29th, 2008,
we inadvertently became friends."
"When I heard about Isabella's tragedy,
I couldn't resist putting myself in your position."
"Since that sad day, I've had several sleepless nights
thinking about you and your sweet daughter."
"I could only imagine your heartache."
"But I'm aware that I'll never begin to fathom it."
"I kept thinking if there was anything I could do to help you."
"So on April 18th,
on mine and Isabella's birthday,
I made a protest banner against impunity."
"Since then, I've been to several protests,
including the one on the day of the trial."
"I stood in front of the court until their sentence was given."
[sewing machine whirring]
ISABELLA FOREVER
[Jose] We were anxious about it until the very end, you know?
Because every day, every week, every month,
we would get more news.
People wanted to know how the investigation was going.
We suffered for two whole years.
[Ana] The eve of the trial was…
[laughs]
…the worst eve I've ever lived.
Time stood still, the day wouldn't come.
MARCH 22ND, 2010
[woman 9] Today marks the beginning of the trial for the couple
Alexandre Nardoni and Anna Carolina Jatobá,
who are charged with the death of Isabella in March of 2008.
[reporter 16] This trial has garnered unprecedented attention
in the history of the Brazilian press.
There's a significant buzz surrounding this wildly televised trial
with a lot of activity happening in this context.
[Robinson] The trial was insane.
A sidewalk in front of the court was totally occupied by the crowd.
[Ilana] I was afraid of them.
There were so many people there, so many press crews.
The overwhelming presence of individuals surrounding you
made me hesitant to enter.
I kept thinking, "What am I doing here?"
THE NARDONIS CHANGE THEIR ATTORNEY AT THE EVE OF THE JURY TRIAL
[woman 10] Trust is paramount in any client-attorney relationship.
In cases involving felonies against life, like this homicide,
clients require someone exceptional, a specialist in the field.
And Roberto Podval has a lot of experience.
He's one of the most brilliant attorneys in the country.
I guess they felt safe in his hands.
[reporter 17] Roberto Podval, 44, and Francisco Cembranelli, 49,
graduated from the same law school in São Paulo
and are at the peak of their career.
Podval has worked on some controversial cases
and won 13 of the 15 cases he worked on before Isabella's.
[dramatic sting]
Clearly, it was a lost cause.
But am I supposed to reject a case
just because it seems like a lost cause at first?
They are being judged unjustly.
And in fact, they have the right to defend themselves.
[reporter 18] The attorney, Roberto Podval, was booed by the crowd
as he was walking into the courthouse.
[Ilana] Podval was physically assaulted in front of the court.
That's insane. Attorneys don't defend crime.
It was very sad.
People were cheering for a condemning sentence
in front of the court.
Their sentiments were fueled by the daily media coverage
that consistently featured the case in the news.
[reporter 19] This law student brought food and water.
She woke up early to be the first in line.
[reporter 20] André, where did you come from?
About 500 miles from here. It's in the north of Minas Gerais.
They have to go to jail. They are murderers.
They're guilty.
I think they're guilty until proven otherwise.
There's no evidence of a third person at the crime scene.
I think they're guilty.
They need to go to jail. They're monsters.
As I know God exists, I know they did it.
Society is sentencing them.
[Flávia] Then, there are the jurors,
who are laymen representing society in judging someone else.
When those individuals entered the court to pass judgment to the couple,
it's very hard to imagine that they'd be unbiased.
JUDICIARY POWER REGIONAL COURT
It's kind of like winning the lottery…
JUROR
…being a part of the jury for a case such as the Nardoni's.
First, you need to be registered as a jury member on that court.
Afterwards, 25 jurors are preselected for a specific case,
and from those 25 jurors, only seven will be selected.
JUDGE
[pensive music playing]
[Roberto] The prosecutor
looks at the jury, who is already carrying all that weight,
that huge burden of public opinion,
and says,
"You are responsible for the result,
and you'll answer for it before society."
Is that what someone who seeks justice would say?
The defense requested that the Supreme Court invalidate the jury
due to the jurors' lack of impartiality
resulting from the public commotion generated during the trial.
The only way to get a truly impartial trial
would be to hold it on Mars.
Because everyone in Brazil knew about it. Of course the jury had been influenced.
[Ana] I got there, and then I was the first person to give a deposition.
[Francisco] I chose four witnesses.
The first was Isabella's mom, Ana Carolina.
She could describe that family's history.
She could discuss her relationship with her daughter,
with her ex-husband,
with the stepmother.
She could describe her relationship with Alexandre while they were married,
how it was after the divorce, or even when the crime happened.
It was an important statement with emotional weight.
[Ana] When I walked into the court to give my statement,
I remember I was facing the judge,
and the couple was sitting towards my right-hand side.
I didn't make any eye contact with them.
I didn't want to look at them.
I tried to focus on what I had to do right there and then.
I tried not to care about them being there.
This Monday, the reporter Sandro Barbosa
watched Anna Carolina Oliveira's deposition.
What was the most moving moment of Anna Carolina's deposition?
Every time she was reminded of her daughter,
every time she was questioned about their mother-daughter relationship,
she'd get emotional.
At one point, she was talking about how her daughter had this desire
to learn how to read and write.
Then she started crying as she remembered her daughter.
WITNESS: ISABELLA'S BIGGEST DREAM WAS TO LEARN TO READ
SINCE SHE WAS BEING LITERATE AT SCHOOL AND…
(AT THAT MOMENT, THE WITNESS STARTS TO CRY AGAIN)
[Ana] I gave my deposition.
I was talking for hours about my memories,
about all that warmth, about all those emotions…
[Francisco] After the deposition, the judge is obligated to inquire
whether the parties agree to dismiss the witness.
The witness may remain secluded in the premises
but cannot be dismissed unless all parties agree.
When the judge asked, "Can she be dismissed?"
I agreed to it. The defense disagreed to it.
The confrontation is done to contradict their points,
the accused and the mother.
I'm very interested in doing it.
I did that just to be safe.
I did not want the mother to watch the trial,
so that's what I needed to do then.
And I took a lot of heat back then because of that.
I've prepared myself for that situation, for the trial.
I was prepared to face the reality of those problems again.
But I wasn't prepared to be in isolation.
The judge Maurício Fossen confirmed that Isabella's mother must stay
until the last deposition is finished.
Emotionally, with the defense's request to keep the mother isolated,
she'd have to stay there for days.
The witnesses have to be isolated.
She was emotionally shaken, so it was a delicate decision.
They're killing my granddaughter.
They keep killing her every day, and now they want to kill my daughter.
She needs her family's support.
It's the bare minimum.
She needs that right now, the support of her family.
We're right here for her, but they denied her this right.
They denied her the right of suffering, of screaming.
[camera shutters clicking]
They wanted her to be as far away from the jury as possible.
She suffered so much being alone in that room,
without me, without her father…
She didn't have anyone, really, who could comfort her,
who could be there for her.
Even those who brought her food couldn't talk to her.
[Maurício] They are isolated from the jurors.
She couldn't leave the premises, she couldn't go to a hotel.
Everything happened in there.
We'd leave the courtroom and,
on the other side of the hallway,
there was a room which was adapted to be a dormitory.
She also had to spend a few nights at the court.
And her room was sort of wall-to-wall with our room.
I never saw her,
but we could hear her crying several times.
She was very emotional because of her daughter.
I remember that very clearly.
That kind of stuck with me.
[Ana] So I had to spend four days there.
I was left there alone in a room.
I couldn't stand that any longer.
After all, it was my daughter's trial.
It was the unraveling of the story of my life.
And I couldn't even watch it.
[Francisco] At a certain point, I don't know why, he gave up,
and agreed to have Anna Carolina be dismissed.
And she didn't even watch the trial.
She was so emotionally distraught she decided to go home.
I just got to a point where I couldn't be there anymore.
It was really tough. Being there was really hard.
Not being able to talk to anyone.
Things were happening out here,
and I couldn't know about it, talk about it.
He left me trapped in there during my time of greatest need.
[Ilana] That mother couldn't watch her daughter's murderers' trial.
That's rough.
She was kept from taking part in what could be a healing process for her
and what could help her fully understand what happened.
[Marcelo] If I were the attorney for the Nardoni couple,
I would've tried to refute each piece of evidence.
I would've tried to disprove every piece of evidence
by analyzing each of them individually.
[Ricardo] Podval is an amazing lawyer.
I have the utmost respect for him, but his defense argument wasn't the best.
I mean, after all, it was a difficult job, right?
They were definitely getting a sentence, you know?
For instance, I think the defense attorneys did a bad job
when handling a few details about the forensic report.
[Francisco] The defense is hindered? Why?
Listen, I cannot and will not assert that the defense is being hindered.
However, what I can say is that, from the moment we entered this place,
we have been burdened with the challenges of this case.
[somber music playing]
[Ricardo] I heard about the Nardoni case right from the beginning,
because the couple's attorneys came to me and asked me to join the team.
But I told his father, "Look,
keep your money because your son is guilty."
"He'll be convicted."
Even though I didn't agree with a bunch of stuff detailed in the report.
REPORT: HOMICIDE
VICTIM: ISABELLA NARDONI
SUBMITTER: RENATA PONTES
[Rogério] The police, the forensics, the public ministry…
No one had an ace up their sleeve.
That evidence that no once can refute.
So what did they do?
PUBLIC SAFETY OFFICE
A little 3D video
in which they created a story of the crime
to try to describe what happened that night.
That was their ace.
But, deep down, that's nothing.
Someone created that.
VICTIM IMMOBILIZATION SITE
[Marco] That video captured what happened according to the population's opinion.
But the trial goes way beyond that.
The animation was created
using the evidence found at the crime scene and the simulation.
They refused to attend.
But we had sufficient elements to establish a timeline.
Is it the truth? It's the truth according to forensics.
They put in the work, compiled a report, and reconstructed the crime
based on their understanding of how the evidence would've been left.
[pensive music playing]
[Ricardo] It's kind of like a syndrome.
I see that a lot in police reports.
I call it Sherlock-ism.
As if the professional thinks they need to explain everything.
They found, if I stand correctly, 13 bloodstains or droplets.
And then they came up with a story.
"From here, she went over there, then she sat over there,
then she got up, she went to her sibling's bedroom…"
The prosecution needs a complete version during the trial.
Like a short film. A story with a beginning and all their movements.
With that, the jurors believe that the prosecution knows everything.
But that's not true in Isabella's case. We don't know everything.
On the victim's bedroom door,
there was a bloodstain in the shape of a child's hand.
The attorney asked,
"Why doesn't the child touch the door on your video?"
The forensic team answered, "It didn't fit our story."
So this is my question,
"Which other elements were found by the CSIs
but didn't fit the 'story' presented by the video?"
[tense music playing]
[Rosangela] Are some of the facts wrong?
Sure.
For instance, the moment of aggression, in which she hits Isabella in the head.
This is not exactly how it happened.
[Francisco] That's where Isabella was.
She has a wound on her head, as shown in the picture.
This wound bled inside the car.
They applied a reagent to the car,
and it tested positive for the presence of blood.
[Rosangela] It's a reagent that allows us to see a bloodstain.
Even after it's been cleaned.
I used the reagent to see them.
I imagined other stains could be around, and I was right.
There were other stains.
I also confirmed that it was human blood.
BLOOD (VICTIM'S GENETIC PROFILE CONFIRMED)
[Roberto] There was an assault in the car,
so they decided to check the car for blood.
However, the blood they found in the car
could not be definitively confirmed as Isabella's.
[Ricardo] They conducted a DNA test which wasn't conclusive,
but it did indicate the presence of male blood.
So what did this bloodstain determine?
That she was attacked? No! It wasn't her blood.
IMPOSSIBLE TO EXTRACT THE DNA DUE TO THE EXIGUITY OF THE SAMPLE
[Rosangela] We couldn't establish that the blood belonged to Isabella
as it was mixed with the genetic profile of another family member.
It belonged to one of the kids, and was found mixed with their blood.
It was likely the baby's blood, given its location on the infant car seat.
[Ricardo] Then they were trying to make it work.
They said, "Well, he wrapped her head in a diaper."
Where's the proof?
"We found a bloody diaper."
"Did you run a DNA test?" "No."
So it's not proof.
SUBSEQUENTLY, ANNA JATOBÁ SQUEEZES THE VICTIMS NECK
And then the strangling.
The victim's neck injuries are real.
The morgue was able to find nail marks.
LESIONS CHARACTERISTIC OF ASPHYXIA DUE TO STRANGULATION
They can't prove that she strangled the girl.
DEFENSE ATTORNEY
We observed distinct signs of asphyxiation.
In this particular case, though, it would be extremely difficult
to determine whose hand was responsible for causing those marks.
If you intend on sentencing two people for a child's death,
you have to be able to point out what each of them did.
Who threw her from up there? Who killed her? Who did what?
How can they prove who did what?
They can't.
It's easier to believe in the classic story
of an evil stepmother who goes and leaves those marks,
then works it out with Alexandre,
as though everything was akin
to a horror movie orchestrated against that child.
I asked the forensics officer,
"Why did you show, in the video,
that the stepmother strangled the victim
if the doctor himself says it can't be confirmed?"
It was an observation, as simple as that.
Alexandre Nardoni bites his nails all the way to the base.
Anna, on the other hand, had normal-length nails
that could leave those marks.
[Ilana] Of course, some people question it.
They make sure to pinpoint every mistake,
but every investigation in the world has flaws.
Then I said to the jury,
"This report was done by the Institute of Forensic Medicine of São Paulo,
one of the most respected in the country, and by Hospital das Clínicas."
"But Mister Podval,
who has never attended a medical school…"
"No one in his team understands forensic medicine,
yet they want to tell you this is a lie."
"Who would you rather trust here?"
[pensive music playing]
[Marcelo] Some parents think it's okay to spank their children.
Let's say one of those parents spank their child, the child fell,
hits their head on an edge and dies.
Considering this hypothesis,
let's say this father thought,
"Holy fucking shit! What do I do now?"
Then, he tries to fake an accident.
[Rosangela] Suddenly, his mind stops working,
he's unable to make use of critical thinking,
unable to think about consequences,
so he acts instinctively, aggressively.
There's a French term.
The insanity of a couple.
It's very characteristic of the Nardoni couple and others.
So they're not psychopaths.
Neither of them fit the profile of a psychopath.
People are so much more than the crime they commit.
[Ilana] Here's the thing, though.
We can prove that both of them took equal parts in it.
They are equally responsible for her death.
And no matter how people spin this,
they can't remove the couple from the crime scene
at the time of the fall.
No matter how we look at it,
they can't be placed elsewhere at the time of the fall.
[tense music playing]
The trial reaches its fifth and last day with no scheduled time to end.
After watching defense and prosecution battle,
the jury will gather at the secret room with the judge, prosecutor, and attorneys.
[Flávia] The people who were outside of the courthouse,
and were waiting to listen to the judge casting the sentence on the microphone
wouldn't react well if they got absolved.
And then the judge had the nerve to place several loud speakers
out on the street
just to read a sentence out loud.
And a sentence which was, at the very least, aggressive.
A hostile sentence against those human beings whom he was judging.
He's a judge!
We're expecting the jury's decision to be announced through a sound system
so that the people who are standing here outside the courthouse
may hear the sentence in real time
as Judge Maurício Fossen is reading it inside the courtroom.
[Maurício] Would the press read my sentence live?
Would they present their own version of it?
So each news channel could come up with a different version
of what was said in the sentence.
All of that was taken into consideration.
[reporter 21] This is a surprising sight. People are refusing to leave.
People were emotionally involved in this whole thing.
The whole of Brazil and I were waiting for that decision.
Then, during the last few moments,
I was with my husband.
I was holding his arm and holding his hands just like this,
and we were waiting for the sentence.
The silence was nerve-racking.
When the judge, Maurício Fossen, announced they were guilty,
I'm not sure how I didn't break my husband's hand.
[Maurício] They are sentenced to the following:
Alexandre Alves Nardoni
is sentenced to spend 31 years, one month, and ten days in jail
for the practice of homicide against a minor,
to a triple degree, aggravated by the fact that the victim was his daughter.
Eight months of arrest for procedural fraud.
Anna Carolina Trotta Peixoto Jatobá
is sentenced to spend 26 years, and eight months in jail
for homicide against a minor, to a triple degree.
I cried, and I cried, and I cried because that was…
the answer. It was the justice I had sought for so long.
[reporter 22] A murderer's conviction
announced by Judge Maurício Fossen at Santana Courthouse
brought relief and tranquility to an outraged population.
[Ana] I watched the sentence live on TV.
They showed it on TV.
It reminded me of a FIFA World Cup final.
-[cheering] -[fireworks bursting]
[all] Isabella! Isabella!
No!
It wasn't a moment to celebrate.
I just wanted justice to be done. And it was.
[cheering, fireworks continue]
[reporter 23] The sentence of 31 years for him
and 26 years for her pleased those who watched the trial.
That inspires hope in all of us Brazilians.
Hope and trust in our justice system.
It's the least they could do for the mother.
I love it! My soul is at peace.
[cheering]
[all] ♪ Justice! Justice! ♪
[fireworks bursting]
[man 18] Murderers!
[sirens wailing]
While the crowd was screaming out there,
the sad silence inside the courtroom was absolutely deafening.
The atmosphere was heavy.
It was hard to breathe
because who had really won here?
Nobody celebrated.
Nobody.
Nobody smiled.
Their sentence was given two years ago.
[reporter 24] Do you believe the appeal will annul the trial?
It's hard to believe in anything in this country.
But I'll keep on believing.
[Roberto] So this couple has three children,
two of whom are their own, and one belongs to the father.
They have a peaceful life
as seen in the videos of them strolling through the parks and whatnot.
Then one day, they arrive home, they go upstairs,
they fight, they hit one of the kids,
they use a pair of scissors to cut a hole in the safety net,
and they throw the daughter out of the window.
That was considered an absolutely truthful story.
They convicted a couple to over 30 years of prison for him,
and 26 for her,
but they can't determine who did what.
There are no doubts in my mind
that the story we heard did not actually happen.
No shadow of a doubt.
I'm going to say this today, and you may call me out in a few years.
That this is the first and only trial for the Isabella Nardoni case.
There will not be another trial pertaining to this case.
[pensive music playing]
SINCE 2008, ALEXANDRE NARDONI AND ANNA CAROLINA JATOBÁ REMAIN IN PRISON
THEY DENY THEY COMMITTED THE CRIME
[Marcos] If they were keeping a lie up to this point,
one can't help but wonder if the husband and the wife
had some sort of agreement that allowed them to endure their arrest
and the ensuing impact on their entire family
while still maintaining their allegations of innocence towards the crime.
[Marcelo] I suppose there was a certain expectation among people
that either the father or the stepmother
would eventually confess and describe what had actually happened.
[Aldo] They want the shortest sentence they can get.
I mean, they're a young couple.
They still have a life to live once they get out.
What's left of that man?
When he leaves jail, he'll take a look in the mirror and say, "I'm a murderer?"
"I killed my daughter?"
How can he look his son in the eye and say, "Your dad killed your sister"?
Maybe the least dramatic way to go about it
is to consider yourself a victim of a huge tragedy,
of a legal mistake.
To look at it like you're paying for something you didn't do.
Because when you tell yourself that,
you give yourself strength to move forward without looking back.
If, in fact, they are guilty, as the sentence shows,
it's understandable that they would refrain from confessing.
Because confessing would mean losing any remaining sympathy they might have.
The doubt, you know? The remaining doubt if they were victims of an injustice.
[Ilana] They are both guilty,
even if their guilt lies in their silence.
It is highly unlikely for such a crime to have occurred
without their involvement.
Especially considering how this story suggests their complicity.
[Roberto] I've never seen, in the history of criminology,
a couple who was convicted, then thrown in jail for over ten years,
and after all these years, kept their story about being innocent
and who are still together as a couple.
It is obvious that they both would've had the opportunity to be released
if one had accused the other.
[Marcos] We're left with a question.
Would the stepmother accept paying for something she didn't do?
[pensive music playing]
[Rosa] I ran into Jatobá, Anna's father, at the courthouse.
I ran into him in the hall, and I said, "Mr. Jatobá, tell her to confess."
"Tell her to confess."
He said, "Mrs. Rosa, I told her, but they won't let her."
"They won't let her."
He told me that. I heard it with this very ear.
Financial abuse is a significant aspect in this case.
It's not something you hear about often, but it does exist.
This woman's decisions are subject to financial control,
where even purchasing sanitary pads requires seeking permission and funds.
The lack of independence in acquiring basic necessities
is degrading for any woman.
Without receiving financial support,
she wouldn't even have the means to afford a private attorney
or to provide for her children's welfare.
The decision to remain together as a couple
involves multiple complex factors.
Nobody is naive enough to think that after 14 years,
they're still living in a romantic fairy tale.
SINCE 2022, THE COUPLE HAS BEEN GRANTED SPECIAL FURLOUGHS,
INCLUDING ON MOTHER'S DAY AND FATHER'S DAY.
[Ana] After Isabella passed away, and after the trial,
I really needed a fresh start to my life.
[birds chirping]
I thank God I had the opportunity to meet my current husband,
an amazing person.
He embraced my story.
He got into a relationship with me
knowing from the start that it wouldn't be easy.
And I rebuilt my life with him.
With him,
I experienced the joy of becoming a mother once more.
Which is something I've always dreamed of.
I've always wanted to become a mother again.
It was a goal of mine.
And thankfully, I was able to fulfill that goal.
It was an emotionally challenging pregnancy.
Because as soon as I got pregnant again, everything started to surface once more.
[gentle music playing]
But after being pregnant with Miguel,
I was pregnant with Maria Fernanda, and that was a little easier.
Today,
I'm not an overprotective mom.
I never tried to hide it from them.
They don't carry this burden of being…
the siblings of someone who suffered so much.
For a long time, I'd go to bed thinking that,
"I want us to meet again, no matter where."
"Where ever you are, I want us to meet."
"I promised you something, and I delivered it."
"Here's where we start anew."
THE NARDONI AND JATOBÁ FAMILIES REFUSED TO GIVE AN INTERVIEW FOR THIS DOCUMENTARY
BASED ON THE BOOKS BY ILANA CASOY AND ROGÉRIO PAGNAN
[gentle music playing]
[music fades]