A Manhattan jury has found Renato Seabra, a 23-year-old Portuguese former model, guilty of second-degree murder after he brutally killed and castrated his lover, 65-year-old Portuguese journalist Carlos Castro last year.
Seabra’s lawyers had originally pursued a not guilty defense on the grounds of criminal insanity. They claimed their client believed he was on a mission from god to rid the world of homosexuality and in killing Castro he was making the world a better place.
Seabra allegedly wore his victim’s testicles as a bracelet as a form of protection, wandering the streets of Manhattan and touching people with the belief that he could cure AIDS.
Castro’s mutilated body was found in his hotel room on January 7, 2011 following an argument with Seabra. A popular fashion journalist and gay rights activist, Castro met Seabra when the then-aspiring model competed on a Portuguese reality show.
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Castro showered his boytoy with gifts and money, helping him forward his modeling career with trips to London and New York. But while staying in Manhattan’s Intercontinental Hotel, Castro witnessed Seabra flirting with women. According to trial testimony, he confronted the younger man, broke off the relationship and made arrangements to cut their trip short.
That was when Seabra went off. He reportedly yelled “I’m not gay anymore!” as he beat and tortured Castro for over an hour before using a corkscrew to stab and castrate him. Seabra then showered, changed, slit his wrists and took a cab to St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital for treatment, where he was subsequently arrested.
Prosecutor Maxine Rosenthal told jurors that Seabra acted out of rage not insanity. Though Seabra was examined by 20 doctors at Bellevue Medical Center, all of whom agreed he had a serious mental illness, the prosecution’s expert witness, psychologist William B. Barr, concluded that Seabra was not psychotic at the time of the murder.
“The motive is as clear as if it were written in lights on a Times Square marquee,” Rosenthal said during closing arguments. “It’s about rage. It’s about humiliating and emasculating the victim.”
Rosenthal said Seabra invented the story about the testicular jewelry to save himself, noting that he had the presence of mind to shower, change, slip $1600 out of Castro’s wallet and place a “do not disturb” sign on their hotel room door.
Renato Seabra now faces a minimum 15 years in prison for second-degree murder.
Ron Jackson
Wow, them sugar-babies can be mean! RIP Carlos.
Raquel Santiago
I just dont get what we as a society and individuals are doing. Killing each other, discrimination, greed without our own communities yet we still want equality? I remember growing up my parents said, “you think its hard now wait till you get older its going to be worse”. I dont think they realized just how much worse.
CivicMinded
15 years for torturing someone to death? Probably much less if he gets out on parole? Bernie Madoff got a life sentence and he didn’t kill anyone. Our priorities are screwed up.
jwrappaport
@CivicMinded: I can’t disagree more with you.
First, consider the criminals: Seabra is a kid – a sugar baby likely without much education or life/work experience. He is also mentally unstable if the above facts are true. Enter Madoff, a college-educated stock broker’s son who attended law school before starting his own securities firm. An intelligent, sophisticated man by any measure.
Second, consider the crimes: Seabra’s crime can properly be called one of passion whose effects were felt locally. Madoff perpetrated a very different crime, one that was methodically planned and executed by a calculating, reasoned mind over a period of more than a decade. He knew exactly what he was doing and to whom, and he did it anyway. Moreover, his is a crime whose effects were felt internationally and is one that directly destroyed hundreds of lives if not more.
Madoff’s crime was worse by orders of magnitude, and it’s a pity Shylock wasn’t his judge.
Evji108
It would really take some balls to go out in Manhattan wearing that kind of jewelry.
Bob LaBlah
This reads like a modern day Andrew Cunaanan who was caught before he could murder another well to do sugar daddy. I do not see model looks in him at all. I wonder if it was coke or meth he had done prior to snapping.
Juanjo
@CivicMinded:
Bernie Madoff ripped off a bunch of millionaires and they do not like that.
Doughosier
In almost all of these “sugar daddy” killings, the younger man doesn’t identify as gay but was seduced by the money. That seems like a recipe for disaster. Find a gay boy!