The Werewolf Capital of South America

It started on a Monday. The seventh of July, 2008 to be precise. The New Moon hung in the sky like a watchful eye, and the warm Brazilian night was about to be disturbed by the sudden presence of something which can only be described as a monster. The witness claimed that it was '*half-man and half-wolf*', and she was so terrified by the sight that she quickly reported it to the local police. This wouldn't be an isolated incident, however - it only marked the beginning of a nightmarish panic in which werewolf fever would hold several regions of Brazil in its iron grip...

## Terror in Tauá

The day after the unnamed woman reported her monster sighting, a 12-year-old boy also came forward and told the police that he had seen the frightening figure lurking about close to his house in the municipality of Tauá in Brazil's Ceará state. The monster involved in both of these cases was described as being very ugly and as smelling like sulphur. Events continued to escalate - on Wednesday of that week (just three days into the panic) the police received two reports of werewolf-like creatures stealing local sheep. Also by Wednesday, the hairy critters had been accused of breaking into numerous houses, but unfortunately the incidents which led to these allegations have not been detailed in any of the sources.

The regional deputy police officer, Marcos Sandro Lira, made his viewpoint very clear when he said that the people who were reporting the monsters were '*innocent and naive*' and that it seemed more likely to him that there were common felons using werewolf masks to scare the villagers while they stole their sheep. He confirmed that he had indeed officially recorded the two cases from Wednesday of that week, but he said that the police force were looking for a group of criminals acting like Scooby-Doo villains instead of hunting for legitimate werewolves. Priests warned their parishes to say their prayers and to keep their crucifixes with them at all times. After news of these bizarre incidents spread, some people started calling Tauá the '*Werewolf Capital of South America*' - thus giving me my attention-grabbing title.

Earlier that same year, in the city of Santana do Livramento of Rio Grande do Sul state, another enigmatic entity had whipped citizens up into a panic in a similar manner. It was April of 2008 and a humanoid simply known as the '*Black Caped Man*' was busy causing nocturnal carnage. Very little information exists about this brief outbreak of hysteria, but deputy officer Eduardo Sant’Anna Finn of the local police force decided that the reports were naught more than folklore - he announced that his men had '*more important things to solve*' and that was that. A priest by the name of Valerio Silveira of the *Prayer House* church thought that it was necessary to adopt emergency spiritual measures against this shadowy spectre. He handed out '*bloodied*' crucifixes splattered with red paint, which were supposedly able to repel the Black Caped Man. To me, even the name of this admittedly nebulous supposed entity makes me think of the Victorian Spring-Heeled Jack, and *forgetomori.com* thought of this same comparison.

## Tauá was Just the Beginning

Santana do Livramento was seemingly not the last place in the state of Rio Grande do Sul on the lycanthrope's hit-list. On the night of January 28th 2009, Kelly Martins Becker was attacked by a very strange animal. She described it as looking like a large dog, but as standing on its hind feet and walking like a human. She reported her terrifying encounter to the police - claiming that the monster had scratched her face and arms. The police then told the press that Kelly had been subjected to a medical examination in which the wounds had been confirmed to be present. As was the case in Tauá less than one year previously, the police once again defaulted to the suspicion that perhaps there was a violent felon roaming around in a monster costume.

The fourth and final incident involving what was ostensibly a werewolf we shall be discussing here took place in August of 2012 The monster had seemingly moved on for four years before coming back to the state of Ceará. The witness (named Marcos) lived near Orós in Ceará - his house being positioned near a large lake. For many nights before his encounter took place, he had been hearing strange sounds coming from the lake valley. One of his friends, who lived near him in that same valley, was a shepherd and had lost two of his flock in recent days. There had been no blood found at the scene, but there were large canine tracks left in the mud around the lake edge. He and this harried shepherd decided to join forces and to wait out the night in order to search for the source of the sounds if they came back.

It was roughly 23:00pm when the weird grunting sounds started up, seemingly coming from a swampy area with a natural spring which was below Marcos's property. Both men were carrying shotguns, and were hoping to catch and kill the pest which they thought would turn out to be a wild dog or maned wolf. They had never seen any of these animals in their many years living in the area, but hey - what else could it be?

As the intrepid men edged ever closer to the dark swamp, something over 2 meters tall stood up among the weeds. It was hard to see under the cover of night, but both witnesses immediately concluded that what they were seeing was a wolf-man. The creature looked like a man but had the head and upper body of a large canine. Shocked and terrified at this wholly unexpected sight (Marcos had heard legends out of Ceará before, but hadn't put much stock in them), he shot once at the monster. This was unsuccessful, and the inexplicable varmint made a speedy getaway. The two men were likely stood still in stunned silence, but I can imagine that chills ran up their spines when they started hearing the monster's distinctive grunting sounds coming from the swamp once again. A shape moving on all fours charged out of the weeds towards them...

The monster was barrelling towards Marcos, presumably with nothing but revenge on its mind, and it was rapidly gaining on its intended prey. It was so close to the terrified man that when the shepherd took action against it he had to deliberately miss the creature with his shotgun as to ensure that he wouldn't hit Marcos by accident. Likely frightened off by this final shotgun blast, the werewolf turned and ran back towards the valley.

The two witnesses spent another few weeks hunting for the monster, but never heard it again. Some of the locals that they told about it immediately concluded that what they had encountered was a werewolf. The local authorities apparently refused to search for the creature, and so Marcos wrote to Lon Strickler's *Phantoms and Monsters* website to hopefully get some help from the wider paranormal community. Lon then published his account along with a roundup of some of the other cases I've presented here.

## Sources

'A Brazilian Werewolf' on *Forgetomori.com*

 'A Brazilian Werewolf is Back' on *Forgetomori.com*

 'Werewolves of Brazil' on *Phantomsandmonsters.com*