THIS is the shocking moment a neighbourhood vigilante caught a suspected bike thief transporting a body in a supermarket trolley.
CCTV footage shows the man guiding the shopping cart down a suburban street in Sao Paulo at 2am, not realising he had been seen.
The grim scene – which unfolded on December 2 in the residential district of Vila Formosa – shows the man at first calmly walking down the quiet street.
The video then cuts to another angle, where he appears to realise he was being watched.
He then heaves the cart onto its side and sprints back the way he came, leaving the trolley abandoned in the middle of the road.
The witness – a 39-year-old teacher – who had been conducting his own stakeout of the street, made the grim discovery after suspecting the man had been transporting a trolley filled with spare bike parts.
By chance, he had set up his own stakeout that evening, following the theft of two bicycles from his home.
Acting on his suspicions that a local rough sleeper – nicknamed “Cicatriz” (“Scar”) due to the scarring on his face – had been behind the thefts, the teacher had set up camp in his car to watch the street.
Instead of bike parts, the teacher uncovered the body of a woman wrapped in a nylon sack, plastic and a bed sheet.
She had been tied up and crammed into the metal basket.
He immediately called police, who sealed off the road and launched an investigation into the alleged homicide.
Police have since identified the victim through a fingerprint test, revealing her to be 43-year-old Angelica Alves Camargo.
Camargo’s family members said they did not believe she had any relationship with the suspect, despite neighbours having reported seeing them together just days before she vanished.
According to forensic examiners, Camargo’s body showed no obvious external injuries.
Tests have been ordered to find out whether she died by asphyxiation, poisoning, overdose or another cause.
Cops have also named 33-year-old Cicatriz – whose real name is Erick Pereira dos Santos – as the man in the footage.
Local media have described him as the city’s most wanted man, following the footage being made public.
According to investigators, Cicatriz had been at a local bar shortly before he was captured on the CCTV, where he’d drunk two beers and ran off without paying.
He left behind a bumbag containing a pipe, lighter and a sachet, which cops have since seized as evidence.
Police allege his name is connected to multiple previous cases, and that he already has a criminal record, with incidents including violence against women.
The Department of Homicide and Protection of the Person (DHPP) asked a judge to issue a 30-day temporary arrest warrant for Cicatriz, saying the coldness of his behaviour demonstrated a high level of “dangerousness”.
The warrant was granted.
Investigators have registered the case as a homicide.
Cicatriz remains on the run, as detectives review the CCTV from the area, tracing his movements prior to the trolley being abandoned.
Investigators are waiting on the results from a full forensic report to determine how Camargo died, to confirm whether she was killed where her body was found or moved there afterwards.
