SISTER MAURINA
WHERE
- Penal Institutions of Cravinhos and Ribeirão Preto,
DOPS (Department of social and public order) - São Paulo.
WHO
- Maurina Borges da Silveira, forty-three years old,
sister of the St.Francisco Order, Director of "Lar Santana"
(eighty pupils) in Ribeirao Preto. Born in Araxa, Minas Geraes;
police officers under the command of chief, Fleury.
WHAT
- They arrested Sister Maurina on October 24, 1969
and tortured her in Cravinhos and at the Dops in Sao Paulo.
Expelled from the country against her will to Mexico in 1970
in exchange for a diplomat kidnapped by the guerrillas.
The case inspired Jorge Andrade to write the play A Miracle
in the Cell: Threats of sexual assault with a piece of wood,
Sister Joana challenges chief Daniel to use his natural
instrument, the instrument that God gave him,
and became pregnant.
HOW - Lynching, electrical shocks.
WHY
- They wanted Sister Maurina to confess links with
one young man whom they accused of being a member of the
FALN (Armed Force to the National Liberation). She too,
was accused of being a member of the same organization.
Acquitted.
" JOANA - If I could change you into a man . . . I would be doing something good for God, to all that are agonizing in this prison. Come! . . . and prove that you still can be a man." (Suddenly, Daniel grab Joana's hair and kiss her violently, possessive. Distressed, Joana gives herself.)
"JOANA - My God! It is the only way . . . the only way!" (Both fall in the floor.) End of the play.A Miracle on the Cell. Jorge Andrade. Ed. Paz e Terra. 1977 pg. 57. Photos: Sister Maurina arriving at her trial.
Women Afro Brazilian Connection Images of Brazilian Music 20 Exemplary cases : : : : Postcards from Bahia
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