Person
João Baptista Macuco Janini
Also known as Dr. Janini, João Janini
- Pathologist and professor of anatomic pathology (Universidade Federal Fluminense, UFRJ, Universidade de Brasília); founder of the IPD in Varginha
João Baptista Macuco Janini is a pathologist who says he has performed more than 50,000 autopsies over sixty years and taught at three federal universities. He examined tissue samples from the autopsy of Marco Eli Chereze, the military police officer whose 1996 death is linked by ufologists to the Varginha case.
His statement presents an extraterrestrial origin of the bacterium as a hypothesis awaiting molecular tests. Press reports of the official necropsy describe septicaemia caused by a common bacterium.
Sources: National Press Club press conference (NewsNation, 20 January 2026) · Itatiaia (2026)
Facts and claims
- claimed In a written statement read at the January 2026 press conference, he said he had access only to tissue fragments from the autopsy of officer Marco Eli Chereze, that the bacterium was of extremely high aggressiveness and lethality, beyond the limits of a conventional infection, which “raises the hypothesis of its alien origin”, and that an exhumation was awaited for molecular studies. Source: Varginha press conference at the National Press Club: James Fox and the Brazilian witnesses (NewsNation live, 20 January 2026) at 1:22:19
Connected files
Claims
Events
Incidents
- Varginha incident (claims about) — He examined tissue from the autopsy of officer Marco Eli Chereze