Swiss prosecutors charge Brazilian woman with faking skinhead attack, miscarriage of twins

Swiss charge Brazilian with faking skinhead attack

ZURICH — Swiss prosecutors have charged a Brazilian woman with faking an attack by skinheads that she said made her miscarry twins, officials said Friday.

Prosecutors, however, are seeking only a fine and not prison time if Paula Oliveira is convicted of deception of justice. They did not say how high the fine could be.

Police said Oliveira claimed she was attacked outside a Zurich train station by three skinheads, one with a Nazi symbol tattooed on the back of his head, and that the purported assailants cut the initials of Switzerland’s main right-wing party into her stomach and legs, causing her to miscarry twins.

Pictures of her scarred body appeared in newspapers and Brazil’s President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva condemned the “remarkable violence against a Brazilian woman abroad.”

But after a series of tests, Swiss police said Oliveira was not three months pregnant as she claimed, and Zurich University forensic medicine chief Walter Baer called it a “textbook case” of self-mutilation. Her passport and legal papers were ordered blocked so an investigators could examine whether she misled law-enforcement authorities.

Prosecutors filed the charges on Wednesday, according to a statement. The case is likely to be brought to court, as Oliveira is contesting the charges.