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Young Brazilian lovers blame each other for murders

"I couldn't resist his spell. [Daniel Cravinhos] was like God for me."

Suzane von Richtofen, claiming that her boyfriend Daniel Cravinhos manipulated her into participating in the murders of her wea

Two estranged young lovers whose relationship crossed Brazil's rigid class lines have blamed each other for plotting the brutal killing of the woman's wealthy parents.

Testifying in court on Monday, Daniel Cravinhos, 25, said he beat Manfred and Marisa von Richtofen to death with an iron bar as they slept at their home in a wealthy district of Sao Paulo because the couple's daughter, Suzane von Richtofen, persuaded him to do it.

Cravinhos, Suzane's former lover, said that he killed the parents because they opposed their affair.

But Suzane told a different story, accusing her estranged boyfriend of inducing her into accepting the killing of her own parents.

"I couldn't resist his spell. He was like God for me," the 22-year-old told a judge and prosecutors, in a trial that has caused a sensation in Brazil.

Suzane, Daniel and his older brother Christian are accused of the murder, but Daniel said he killed the couple himself, at Suzane's behest.

Sexual abuse

Daniel said Suzane told him she was sexually abused by her father and beaten by her mother.

"She said she hated them and wanted to see them dead," Daniel said as the trial opened on Monday. "I was shocked."

Christian said he tried to talk the two out of the killing but failed.

Manfred von Richtofen, 49, was an engineer and the great nephew of the World War I German ace known as the Red Baron, and his wife was a psychologist. The couple disapproved of their daughter's relationship with Daniel, who is from a lower middle-class family, the daughter's lawyers have said.

Daniel said Suzane's father threatened to disinherit her from an estate reportedly worth US$950,000 if she didn't end their relationship.

Daniel testified that Suzane persuaded him to test a gun in the parents' bedroom three months before the murder to see if it made too much noise, but then discarded the idea of shooting them.

And he said Suzane let the brothers into the house on the night of Oct. 30, 2002. Armed with iron bars, they sneaked to the parents' bedroom, but Christian "froze," Daniel said.

He acknowledged hitting each parent "four to six" times in the head and covered their faces with black plastic bags so Suzane's younger brother, Andreas -- who was out at an Internet cafe -- wouldn't see them.

Daniel, Suzane and Christian were not present in the court for each other's testimony.

Testifying after Daniel, Christian said the day of the crime Suzane and Daniel came to his house looking "extremely agitated and nervous."

"Both said they were going to kill Suzane's parents," he told prosecutors. "I tried to calm them down, but I failed."

Suzane testified that she had met Daniel back in 1999 and fell immediately in love. Her parents were not initially opposed to the relationship, but after two years her mother began making observations about her boyfriend, she said.

"My mother said I was for him a lottery prize, the goose of the golden eggs," Suzane said.

Drugs

She said Daniel introduced her to drugs and "by 2002 I was heavily smoking pot, every day."

By that time, she said, Daniel often told her "how nice would be it be to live alone, without your parents, in your big house."

She said that on the day of the killings Daniel proposed they get rid of her parents, threatening to leave her if she didn't go along.

"I was so drugged that I agreed," Suzane said.

Suzane testified that she ransacked the von Richtofens' library to make the attack look like a break-in, while Daniel and his brother went upstairs to her parents bedroom.

Suzane vehemently denied being sexually abused by her father, calling the idea "a perverse lie."

Police say the Cravinhos brothers took some US$7,000 from the house, and investigators were led to Christian when he purchased a new motorcycle the day after the murder, paying for it with 36 US$100 bills.
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