Firemen Deny Involvement

by (brazilian) UFO Magazine team

The statements from Vitorio Pacaccini and Ubirajara Rodrigues, saying that the Fire Department captured ETs in Varginha (MG) [State of Minas Gerais], contradict the word of Pedro Alvarenga, commandant of Fire Department's 13 th Company, who said the corporation wasn't called to attend local ocurrences on January 20th 1996. The commander affirmed that, because they work in public areas, they wouldn't manage to hide the case from the press or the ufologists. He also said that the researchers are trying to involve the Fire Department, the Military Police and the Army with the fact. He claimed that "it would be impossible to hide the case. The emotional aspect of the men involved would change, because it's not an usual capture, and there wasn't any change."

However, Ubirajara and Pacaccini assure they have military witnesses who confirm the fire fighters' involvement attending an occurrence at about 10 :30 a.m. that day in Jardim Andere. According to the witnesses, the firemen arrived at the place with four soldiers in a fire-engine. They found a weird creature in the place and the Army observed closely the whole operation.

The commander stated that "that Saturday, I wasn't in the quarter. The name of the Fire Dept. was involved in a casual way, I don't know, but I think there is no truth regarding this.". Captain Alvarenga (see picture) said the witnesses are not military at all, because "if they would, they'd talk something to the press. Even the population would ask for more facts and evidences that everything really happened". But, according to the ufologists, if the witnesses reveal their names, they would be risking their jobs and harming their lives. Besides, Ubirajara and Pacaccini recognized the witnesses' credentials.

The press tried to take photos and to obtain interviews, but the firemen resisted. The commander tried to justify it, blaming Rede Globo [Globo TV Network], because they did a story on the subject. According to Captain Alvarenga, the Fire Department didn't want to expose itself, in order to avoid complications with the media. "The things complicated because the day people were talking about this creature, it had been a corpse exhumation in the city, and the victim's family thinks the police itself killed the boy".

However, according to a fax received on May 24th, from the Institute of Legal Medicine, which is subordinated to the Minas Gerais State's Secretary of Public Security, the body indicated as belonging to José Maria Misael Filho, 23, was exhumated in the Institute, which in fact is located on the Regional Hospital premises. It is written in the official report that the necropsy was made on January 30th, in other words, more than a week after the witnesses affirm they saw the movements in the hospital.

Alvarenga denied the Fire Department participation in the transportation of this corpse and said that "the fire fighters unit of Tres Coracoes is closer to the Army, therefore it may has been called to some operation with ESA or to transport the victim".

CONTRADICTIONS - We said to the commander that what he was telling us was strange and contradictory, because before that interview we had made contact with Mr. Adilson Usier, director of Regional Hospital, who affirmed that the Varginha's Fire Department [and not the Tres Coracoes' F.Dept.] participated in the corpse transportation. Captain Alvarenga, then, said it was a mistake of Mr. Usier.

According to the commander, "the ufologists involved with the research of this case, Ubirajara and Pacaccini, are imagining everything and making use of the situation, trying to put their names in the media". Pacaccini defends himself : "I'm a very respected person, either in my profession either in my private life. I've never needed the ufological research to promote myself ". The same we can say of Ubirajara.