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August 8, 2025 15 mins
In this chilling episode of Rogue Darkness, we delve into one of Brazil’s most haunting true crime cases—the story of Dyonathan Celestrino, infamously dubbed The Cross Maniac. At just 16 years old, Dyonathan orchestrated a brutal triple murder under the guise of religious salvation, claiming divine command as justification for his acts. What drove this teenager to commit such calculated violence? Was it faith twisted into fanaticism—or something far more sinister?

Join us as we unravel the disturbing timeline of events, the ritualistic symbolism left at the crime scene, and the psychological underpinnings behind one of Brazil’s most shocking cases of religiously-motivated murder.

Listener discretion is strongly advised.

🕯️ Darkness awaits…



Sources Referenced in This Episode:

G1 Globo. “Maníaco da Cruz é condenado a 48 anos de prisão.”
G1 - O Portal de Notícias da Globo, Grupo Globo, 22 Sept. 2010, https://g1.globo.com.

Folha de São Paulo. “Perfil psicológico aponta distúrbio em jovem acusado de assassinato.”
Folha de S.Paulo, Folha Online, 14 Nov. 2008, https://www.folha.uol.com.br.

UOL Notícias. “Adolescente é acusado de matar três e deixar marcas de cruz nas vítimas.”
UOL Notícias, Grupo Folha, 20 Oct. 2008, https://noticias.uol.com.br.

Câmera Record. “O Maníaco da Cruz.”
RecordTV, RecordTV, 2010, https://recordtv.r7.com.

Silva, Renato. “Radicalização Juvenil e Delírios Religiosos: Um Estudo de Caso Brasileiro.”
Revista Brasileira de Psicologia Forense, Conselho Federal de Psicologia, 2014, https://www.cfp.org.br.



Background Music Used In This Episode:
“DARK CHOIR MUSIC” by Mattia Cupelli - License for Use; No Copyright.

Listen to Mattia’s music here: https://m.youtube.com/@MATTIA_CUPELLI
Mark as Played
Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Dark Cast Network. Welcome to the dark side of podcasts.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
Belief they would decliffe animals, dark world of ritualistic chodobies.

Speaker 1 (00:18):
Is there a well organized plot, an insidious design to
program the minds of our children towards the occult and witchcraft?

Speaker 2 (00:26):
Does it make you want to hate murder?

Speaker 1 (00:28):
Or does it make you want to do murder?

Speaker 2 (00:30):
Let's explore the darkness of mankind one crime at a time.

Speaker 1 (00:35):
Welcome back to Rogue Darkness, the podcast that uncovers how
the misinterpretations and misinformation surrounding witchcraft, the occult, and other
beliefs have led many to do unthinkable crimes. From ritualistic
killings and the demons that live in all of us,
to exploration of the macabre and delving deep into the unknown,

(00:56):
Let's explore the darkness of mankind one crime. I'm your
host of the grim and Gruesome.

Speaker 2 (01:03):
Raven Dead people can't receive screeps, You sickos. That was
the comet that would ultimately unravel the twisted mind behind
a series of ritualistic murders that shocked a quiet town
in Brazil. He was young, just sixteen, but what he

(01:26):
lacked in age he made up for in methodical madness.
A self proclaimed perjure of the impure, he lured strangers
in questioned their morality, then pose their lifeless bodies in
the shape of a cross, and vanished into the night.
Today's tale is one that blurs the line between religion, psychopathy,

(01:49):
and teenage obsession. This is the case of Dionathan Celestrino,
the cross maniac. Born in Brazil in the late nineteen eighties,
Dionathan Roches Celestrino appeared at first glance to be a quiet,
intelligent young man. Raised in a religious household, He developed

(02:10):
a strong connection to faith from an early age, but
over time that devotion would twist into something far darker.
By his late teens, Dionathan's religious beliefs had grown into
an obsession. He wasn't just reading the Bible, he was
interpreting it with a warped sense of purpose. Those close

(02:31):
to him noticed a growing detachment from reality. He began
to isolate himself, spending hours alone with religious texts, convinced
that God had chosen him for a higher mission, one
that involved purging the world of what he saw as
sin and corruption. He wasn't part of any official church
or sect. His faith was self styled, built from a

(02:54):
mix of scripture, personal visions, and growing delusions of divine authority.
He believed he was a soldier of God, a holy executioner,
and soon that belief would spill over into real violence.
The killings began in July of two thousand eight. At

(03:15):
just sixteen years old, Dionathan s Cilestrino chose his first victim.
His selection wasn't random, at least not in his own mind.
He believed he was on a mission to cleanse the
impure in the quiet city of Itaquacastuba Sam Paulo, Dionathan's
Shillstrino's inner delusions finally erupted into real world horror. Armed

(03:38):
with a twisted sense of divine justice, he set out
to cleanse society, not through preaching, but through cold blooded murder.
His method was always the same. He would approach his
victims calmly, often asking bizarre, deeply personal questions. He wanted
to know their religious beliefs, their sexual preferences, anything that

(04:01):
might label them as unclean in his warped worldview. Once
deemed guilty, he would strike with deadly precision. After brutally
executing his unsuspecting victims. Next came Dionathan's signature, a crude
cross carved into his victim's foreheads. To Dionathan, this wasn't

(04:23):
just a symbol, it was his holy mark, a testament
to the judgment he believed he was enacting on behalf
of his God. Police reports revealed that the killings all
occurred in a similar fashion, isolated areas, no witnesses, and
the same chilling cross carved post mortem. It wasn't long
before the media dubbed him the Maniac of the Cross.

(04:46):
The nickname spread like wildfire, a haunting label that matched
the gruesome calling card he left behind. Each murder sent
a new wave of fear through the city. And the
most terrifying part, no one knew who he was. No finger, prince,
no leads, just the lingering scent of gunpowder, blood, and
that ever present cross. The first murder took place on

(05:10):
July second, two thousand eight, Catalino Gardena, A thirty three
year old man was found asphyxiated and stabbed in a
chilling pose. His arms were outstretched, legs crossed as if
nailed to an invisible crucifix. Next to his body, a
handwritten note scrawled with the letters I N R I,

(05:32):
the Latin acronym for Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.
But it didn't stop there. August twenty fourth, two thousand eight,
Letitia Neves de Olivera, a twenty two year old gas
station attendant, vanished. Her body was discovered laid out atop
a grave in the local cemetery, the same pose, the

(05:54):
same symbolism, a message purified. October third, two thousand eight,
His youngest victim, Glis Kelly de Silva, was just thirteen
years old, strangled to death, her corpse found arranged in
the same ritualistic way. A new note left behind corpse

(06:15):
of thor until next hell. Dionathan wasn't just killing. He
was staging scenes, creating his own twisted sermons written in blood,
each victim's pose, Each message meant to send a statement,
a performance for the divine, and he didn't plan on stopping.
But while he tried to stay one step ahead, he

(06:37):
left breadcrumbs, and his mask was beginning to slip. As
the body count rose, panic gripped the community. The killing
seemed random, yet calculated. The victims had little in common
other than their vulnerability and the brutal cross carved into
their flesh. Authorities were under immense pressure to find the

(06:59):
purse and responsible for what now looked like serial executions.
Local police, initially baffled, began piecing together patterns, the method
of killing, the location of the bodies, and fragments of
witness reports pointing to a young man seen talking to
the victim shortly before their deaths. Still, the investigation dragged

(07:22):
on until Dionathan made a critical mistake. In late two
thousand eight, following another targeted murder, police received an anonymous tip.
The caller claimed that a teenager in the neighborhood had
been preaching about divine justice and boasting of cleansing sinners
by the will of the cross. Officers followed the lead

(07:43):
and tracked down a teenage suspect, who, under pressure, confessed
to participating in the crimes, but not alone. That teen
revealed something chilling. The mastermind behind the killings was nineteen
year old Dionathan Celestrino. Police rated Dionathan's home. They found
damning evidence, including a Bible filled with handwritten annotations referencing

(08:07):
purification and sacrifice, as well as sketches of crosses and
cryptic scripture references. A point three eight caliber revolver, believed
to be the murder weapon, was also recovered. Dionathan was
arrested without resistance. In fact, he seemed calm, eerily composed,

(08:30):
as if he believed he'd fulfilled his holy mission. During questioning,
he showed no remorse. Instead, he claimed that God had
spoken to him directly and that the murders were righteous.
When Dionathan Celestrino stood trial, the courtroom was packed not

(08:50):
just with press and grieving families, but with curious onlookers
trying to understand how a teenager so young and clean
cut could be capable of such gruesome crime. The prosecution
painted him as cold, calculating, and fanatical, a self styled
messiah who twisted scripture into a license to kill. Witnesses,

(09:14):
including his accomplices, testified that Dionathan saw himself as a
judge of sinners. He believed the homeless, the addicted, and
the lost were unworthy of redemption, that they needed to
be cleansed. His defense leaned on a plea of mental illness,
arguing that Dionathan was delusional, a young man who had

(09:34):
lost all grip on reality due to untreated psychosis. Psychiatrists
were brought in to assess his mental state, and the
results only deepened the debate. One evaluation suggested he suffered
from religious delusions consistent with paranoid schizophrenia. Another insisted he
was fully aware of his actions, driven not by madness

(09:58):
but by a dangerous self constructed ideology. Ultimately, the court
found Dionathan legally sane and criminally responsible for the murders.
In twenty ten, he was sentenced to double life in prison,
a rare and severe punishment in Brazil's judicial system. But

(10:19):
even behind bars, Dionathan never recanted. In letters from prison,
he referred to himself as a vessel of divine wrath
and warned of a coming apocalypse. To this day, he
shows no remorse. For many, that's the most disturbing part
of all. After the trial, Dionathan Tillestrino faded from the

(10:42):
public eye, but his crimes continued to haunt Brazil's collective consciousness.
The media dubbed him Omaniaco d'acruz, the Maniac of the Cross,
a name that would become synonymous with one of the
most disturbing teen killers in the country's history. Newspaper upresplastered
his photo beside headlines that read like something out of

(11:03):
a horror film. True crime shows dissected the case, focusing
on his eerie calmness, the ritualistic killings, and the religious
fixation that set him apart from other murderers. His case
became a modern parable, a warning about the dangers of
unchecked fanaticism and untreated mental illness. But it wasn't just

(11:26):
the media that kept his story alive. In dark corners
of the Internet, a small group of fringe followers began
referring to Dionathan as a kind of martyr or prophet,
proof that even society's outcasts could be chosen for something greater.
These online communities were quickly flagged by authorities, but the

(11:48):
fact that they existed at all showed just how deeply
his crimes had seeped into the darker parts of the web. Meanwhile,
psychologists and criminologists continued to cite the case in studies
about youth radicalization, delusional disorders, and the weaponization of belief systems.
Dionathan wasn't just another teenage killer. He was a symbol

(12:10):
of what can happen when ideology turns deadly. Today, his
name still circulates in hush tones, a specter of religious
violence and psychological collapse, and somewhere in a Brazilian prison,
the cross Maniac waits, unrepentant, unreadable, and utterly consumed by

(12:30):
the faith that led him to kill the case of
Dionathan Celestrino, The cross Maniac is more than just a
story of murder. It's a chilling look at what happens
when belief becomes obsession and when a mind teetering on
the edge is consumed by a self made prophecy. He
wasn't part of a cult. He didn't follow a known

(12:52):
extremist group. He was a teenager who created his own
gospel and wrote it in blood. Cases like diet Jonathan's
force us to ask uncomfortable questions, how do we recognize
the signs of radicalization in youth, What role does untreated
mental illness play in the evolution of violence? And, most disturbingly,

(13:14):
how many others are out there fighting behind silence and scripture.
In the end, Deonathan Celestrino didn't just leave behind bodies.
He left behind a legacy of fear, fascination, and the
sobering reminder that evil doesn't always wear horns. Sometimes it
wears a cross. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider

(13:44):
subscribing to Rogue Darkness on your favorite podcast platform. Your
support helps us continue to bring you more stories of
true crime and the paranormal. Definitely let me know your
thoughts on this case and if you have any questions
regarding it or any.

Speaker 1 (13:59):
Other cases I've previously covered. You can always contact me
at Rogue darknesspod at gmail dot com. You can also
always reach out to me directly on my socials, Instagram, TikTok,
and YouTube are all at Rogue Underscore Darkness. As always,
be sure to share the podcast with anyone who you
think would like it, and be sure to leave a
rating and review over on Apple, iTunes, Spotify, good Pods,

(14:22):
or anywhere else you can leave a review to let
other listeners know you enjoy the show, and if you
want some personalized shoutouts and other exclusives, definitely check out
my Patreon by visiting patreon dot com slash Rogue Darkness.
You can also check out my Bonfire shop if you
want to get your hands on some merch to support
the show even further. As always, all the links for

(14:43):
everything discussed in My episodes are down in the description
box of the episode. And with that said, that concludes
this week's episode of Rogue Darkness. The darkness is all
around us, and I can confidently say that reality, truly,
it is more terrifying than fiction. Until next time,
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