Inquest raises more questions than answers in Brazilian man's death

Samuel De Souza Frota arrived in the United Kingdom in late February, having made his way through Belgium and the Netherlands before crossing the Channel at Dover. He was twenty-three years old. By mid-April, he was dead on a railway line near Newton-le-Willows in Merseyside, struck by a train travelling from Preston. The inquest into his death, held at Bootle Town Hall on July 7, concluded that he had placed himself in front of the train. His family, still in Brazil, believe there is far more to the story than the official finding allows.

The coroner, assistant coroner Elizabeth Wheeler, examined CCTV footage showing Samuel in the fifteen to twenty minutes before his death on the evening of April 12. The images captured him moving steadily closer to the track, dressed in an aviator jacket, jeans, and Chelsea boots. The area was rural, offering clear sightlines for several hundred metres in either direction. Leanne Callan, a fatality investigator for British Transport Police, testified that officers had conducted a forensic search of the scene, looking for evidence of a third party, drag marks, or signs of struggle. They found none. When asked directly whether there was evidence Samuel had been pushed, Callan was unequivocal: the evidence did not support it. When Wheeler asked whether there was any evidence the death was staged to cover up organ harvesting, Callan answered no.

Yet the inquest raised questions it could not settle. Samuel's family had raised concerns about organ harvesting and human trafficking from the outset. To address these claims, Wheeler conducted an unusually detailed reading of the post-mortem injuries and provided a checklist of organs accounted for following the death. One family member had posted on social media that Samuel's body had been stripped of organs before being placed on the tracks. The coroner's meticulous accounting was, in part, a response to this allegation. Samuel was pronounced dead at 7:14 p.m., though Wheeler stated he would have died instantly upon impact.

A typed suicide note, sent to the family digitally, was presented as evidence of intent. Wheeler noted that the note's contents were consistent with someone attempting to take his own life and contained information Samuel would have known about himself. But the family disputes that Samuel wrote it. The note was undated, typed rather than handwritten, and arrived through a third party. Wheeler acknowledged these concerns but ultimately disregarded the note as unnecessary to her finding, relying instead on the mechanism of death and Samuel's actions as captured on camera.

Other details remain unresolved. No phone was recovered from the scene, though a black rucksack was found containing two nearly empty bottles of whiskey, a phone charger, and reading glasses. Despite the quantity of alcohol present, Samuel's toxicology showed low alcohol levels. His phone, according to what is known, remains in the possession of someone claiming to be his friend. Two photographs of Samuel appeared on his Facebook profile on May 16, more than a month after his death, images that had not previously been there.

Samuel's stated occupation at the time of death was listed as a seller, and his LinkedIn profile described him as a retailer for a men's clothing store. His mother, Neire Souza, told the Liverpool Echo this was an old position from before he travelled to Europe. She said he had come to the UK to manage the schedules of sex workers and to work as a doorman. He had spent approximately two and a half months moving through Europe before arriving in Merseyside. Family members posted screenshots on social media showing multiple mobile phones on a table, CCTV footage of people outside what appeared to be his front door, and images of cash in fifty-pound notes.

In recent statements to the Echo, Neire acknowledged that based on what Samuel had told her, she believed psychological pressure had contributed to severe depression, which ultimately led him to take his own life. Yet the family continues to seek answers about the circumstances surrounding his death, the whereabouts of his phone, the origin of the suicide note, and the photographs that appeared on his profile after he was gone. The inquest concluded with a finding of suicide, but for those closest to Samuel, the questions remain open.