Gotcha! Man pranks police by placing a mannequin of a woman on Brazilian beach closed due to COVID-19 pandemic – but cops aren’t amused
- Brazilian authorities on Tuesday fined a man for placing a mannequin of a woman on a beach
- The individual was protesting beach closures imposed by the state of São Paulo
- The incident occurred March 23 in the city of Praia Grande, where beaches remain shut down to the public
- Beaches throughout São Paulo are expected to reopen on April 11; access to the beaches was banned March 15
- São Paulo tops Brazil with 80,742 confirmed coronavirus deaths and 2,597,366 cases, according to data from John Hopkins University
A 29-year-old man was fined this week after he protested a beach closure by placing a mannequin of a woman to prank cops in the southeastern Brazilian state of São Paulo.
The incident took place March 23 in the São Paulo city of Praia Grande, where beaches have remained closed since March 15 as part of a government plan to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The police complaint was officially formalized Tuesday, according to newspaper Folha de São Paulo.
The prankster stood from afar and recorded a video that shows the fully dressed mannequin named ‘Judite’ wearing a hat after he had planted it on the shoreline of a beach located in the Praia Grande neighborhood of Mirim.
A 29-year-old man was hit with a fine after protesting the closure of a beach by the government of the southeastern Brazilian state of São Paulo due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The man placed a mannequin at the beach in Praia Grande and dressed it as a woman. Beaches in São Paulo have been shut down to the public since March 15 and are expected to reopen April 11
A police officer in Praia Grande, a city in the southeastern Brazilian state of Praia Grande, waves at a mannequin that resembled a real person on March 23. A 29-year-old man behind the prank was later arrested and fined an undisclosed amount during a court appearance Tuesday
The viral footage captures the moment cops aboard a Praia Grande Municipal Civil Guard police SUV drove past the mannequin before a second police vehicle stopped in front of the doll, believing it was a real person who had been disobeying the city’s preventive measure.
An officer, realizing the joke, waves at the mannequin and drives off to continue the patrol tour.
The man, whose name was not released by authorities, was arrested after the police reviewed surveillance footage from the area, Secretary of Security Affairs, Maurício Vieira Izumi said, according to online news portal G1.
He was charged with violating a preventive health measure and criminal misdemeanor of a false alarm.
The amount of the fine was not disclosed by the police.
‘Even if he did not intend to infringe the imposed measure, but rather ‘make fun of it’, and with that, engage a [Municipal Civil Guard] vehicle that is available to the citizen to answer a joke, it is unbelievable that in a moment of such consternation for the loss of several innocent lives, of people waiting for the vaccine, a person decides to joke about the lives of others,’ Praia Grande police chief Flávio Magário said.
São Paulo beaches are slated to reopen to the public April 11.
A police officer stops in front of the mannequin while patrolling a beach in Praia Grande, a coastal city in the southeast Brazil state of São Paulo, which tops the country with 80,742 confirmed coronavirus deaths and 2,597,366
Vice-Governor Rodrigo Garcia told reporters Friday that the state will allow customers to pick up takeaway food from bars and restaurants starting on Monday.
Professional sports games will be permitted without crowds, along with a series of other specific activities.
The state tops Brazil with 80,742 confirmed coronavirus deaths and 2,597,366 cases, according data from John Hopkins University released Friday.
Brazil is second in the globe behind the United States with 345,025 deaths and 13,279,857 cases.
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