Who is Danelo Cavalcante? What we know about the escaped prisoner who is now captured

Danelo Cavalcante, the convicted murderer who made a brazen escape from Chester County Prison on Aug. 31, has been captured Wednesday, Sept. 13 after a manhunt lasting nearly two weeks.

It was only a week earlier on Aug. 22 that he was sentenced to life in prison in the brutal stabbing death of his ex-girlfriend in front of her children outside their northern Chester County home in 2021. The sentence came just days after a jury convicted him of first-degree murder in the ghastly crime.

Here’s everything we know about Cavalcante.

Is a native of Brazil

Cavalcante is a native of Brazil. At his sentencing hearing in his ex-girlfriend’s death, his attorneys said that he had grown up poor and had been a victim of abuse himself. He began associating with gang members and became addicted to drugs and alcohol, they said.

He speaks both Portuguese and English.

Is wanted in Brazil on murder charges

Cavalcante is wanted in Brazil for the murder of a man who owed him money. Police there said he shot a man dead in the town of Figueriopolis, located in the northern state of Tocantinis, in November 2017, according to the BBC.

The BBC reported that the killing stemmed from an “alleged debt related to the repair of a vehicle,” according to police. He allegedly shot the man six times, stole his cell phone, and then fled the scene in a car, the BBC reported.

A warrant was issued for Cavalcante’s arrest in June 2018.

He came to U.S. in 2019

After the murder, Cavalcante came to the United States illegally, fleeing to Puerto Rico in 2019. He eventually settled in Schuylkill Township in Chester County.

Who was his ex-girlfriend?

Deborah Brandao, who was 33 years old when she was killed, was also a native of Brazil. She and Cavalcante were neighbors when they started dating, her sister Sarah told CNN.

Sarah Brandao said her sister came to the United States with her children “because here the quality of life is better than in Brazil.”

“She wanted to give a better life for both of them,” Sarah said.

Deborah Brandao and Cavalcante dated for about a year and a half, her sister told CNN. The relationship started out well, but over time he changed and became extremely jealous, Sarah said.

“She kept saying that he was extremely jealous – that when he drank, he became a different person; that he kept going through her cell phone,” Sarah told CNN.

Brandao eventually filed a Protection From Abuse order against Cavalcante in December 2020 after he had pulled a knife on her, police said. The PFA was still active at the time of the murder.

What are the details of the murder?

On April 18, 2021, Cavalcante drove from his home in King of Prussia armed with a knife to Brandao’s home in Schuylkill that she shared with her children, a 7-year-old girl and a 4-year-old boy. The family was outside of the home in the 300 block of Pawling Road when he pulled up in his car and began arguing with Brandao.

At some point, he grabbed her by the hair, threw her to the ground, and began stabbing her repeatedly. There were 37 individual wounds in her abdomen, chest and throat, and she died looking at her son, who was gathered in the arms of a neighbor who came to help.

Brandao’s daughter had run from the scene to the neighbor’s apartment, where she screamed, “Help me! Help me! Help me! He’s going to kill my mommy!”

Brandao was pronounced dead at Paoli Hospital.

What was the motive for the killing?

At his trial, prosecutors said Cavalcante wanted to “silence” Brandao, whom he had assaulted on at least one previous occasion during their tumultuous relationship, from revealing his past to authorities.

Brandao had learned about the murder charges he was facing in Brazil, and she had told his family that she would take that information and “spread it out to the police here” if he did not leave her alone from further abuse.

When she learned he had hacked into her Instagram account to follow her in the spring of 2021, she said she would keep her promise.

Friends helped him escape after the murder

According to testimony at Cavalcante’s trial, he fled the murder scene in his car and called a friend, the man who lived with his sister Eleni in Phoenixville.

“Meet me at the Wawa in Frazer,” he told Francisco Lima.

Cavalcante told him he stabbed his girlfriend. Lima didn’t ask why, and didn’t know if the woman was dead or alive, he said on the witness stand. Lima got him water to help clean his hands, gave him his hooded sweatshirt to wipe up the blood, and accepted a bag with thousands of dollars in cash that he later gave to Cavalcante’s sister.

The pair then drove in separate cars to a storage facility, where they met another man, Michael Scahill, who kept a trailer there for his construction business. Scahill, who told the jury he had been drinking heavily that day, did not contact police or take any actions to stop Cavalcante from fleeing.

“I was scared,” he said in response to a question from District Attorney Deb Ryan.

Lima and Scahill then went to Lima’s home, where they collected clean clothes for Cavalcante, got his fake Puerto Rican drivers’ license, and stopped to get him some food from a nearby McDonald’s. Back at the storage units, they helped clean Cavalcante’s car, and then watched him drive away with an EZ Pass and a full tank of gas.

Cavalcante would not get far, being captured the day after the murder in Virginia after authorities were able to track his movements through his cellphone data.

How did he escape prison?

Cavalcante was being held at Chester County Prison after his sentencing for 30 days so he could converse with his attorneys about whether he would file an appeal of his conviction before being transferred to the state prison system.

He was able to escape a prison yard Aug. 31 by “crab walking” up a wall and over razor wire, officials said.

A corrections officer in an observation tower who missed the escape has been fired. That officer has not identified, but was employed at the prison in West Chester for 18 years.

There were no guards walking in the yard at the time of the escape.

A security video of the escape shows Cavalcante, 34, standing in a passageway bracing his hands against one wall and his feet against another, then walking his way upward out of the camera’s view.

Cavalcante escaped the same way as another inmate in May, and that the prison added the razor wire after the earlier escape.

Why wasn’t he deported after the murder

Although his presence was reported to authorities after his arrest in April 2021, Chester County District Attorney Deb Ryan said she did not believe an immigration detainer had been filed for his deportation.

Normally, she said, immigration cases are not brought until after a defendant has completed their sentence, which in Cavalcante’s case, will be when he has died.

What do we know about his sister?

Eleni Cavalcante was arrested by federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to Pennsylvania State Police Lt. Col. George Bivens, who’s been leading the manhunt. Bivens said she was arrested for staying past her legally allowed period of stay, and law enforcement had no reason to allow her to remain in the country since she was not cooperating with the investigation.

Officials have not said whether Eleni is suspected of helping her brother while he’s been on the run.

What does he look like?

A short and slight man, Cavalcante is 5 feet tall and weighs 120 pounds. At the time of his escape he had bushy hair and an unshaven face.

However, a surveillance image of him taken Sept. 9 shown he had changed his appearance and was now clean-shaven. At the time, he was wearing a green hoodie, but that was later discovered outside a home where he stole a .22 rifle the night of Sept. 11.

He was also initially wearing his white prison-issued sneakers, but those were also found discarded with the hoodie.

Cavalcante was most recently seen in South Coventry Township, Chester County, shirtless and wearing blue pants, state police said Sept. 12. He was carrying the stolen rifle and a flashlight.

Anyone who sees him should call 911 immediately. For general tips or info, call (717) 562-2987.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.