She returned to the apartment to continue getting her nails done.
Former Recife mayor Sérgio Hacker and wife Sarí Côrte Real must pay damages for collective harm, with funds going to worker assistance fund rather than the family. The case highlights systemic discrimination in domestic labor relations and unsafe working conditions that contributed to the tragedy on June 2, 2020.
- Miguel Otávio de Santana, age 5, fell from the 9th floor on June 2, 2020
- Court ordered R$386,730 in collective damages to a worker assistance fund
- Sarí Côrte Real faces 4-12 year prison sentence for abandonment of a minor resulting in death
- Security footage showed Côrte Real allowed Miguel to enter the elevator alone on the fifth attempt after stopping him four times
A Brazilian labor court condemned the former employers of Miguel's mother to pay R$ 386,730 in collective moral damages, citing structural discrimination in domestic work and workplace negligence that led to the child's death.
On June 2, 2020, five-year-old Miguel Otávio de Santana fell from the ninth floor of an apartment building in Recife and died. He had been left in the care of Sarí Côrte Real, the wife of Sérgio Hacker, a former mayor of the nearby municipality of Tamandaré. Miguel's mother, Mirtes Renata de Souza, was outside walking her employers' dog at the time. Both she and Miguel's grandmother worked as domestic employees in the apartment, though they were paid by the municipal government rather than directly by the family.
On March 13, 2021, a labor court judge in Pernambuco ordered Hacker and Côrte Real to pay 386,730 reais in collective moral damages. The money will not go to Miguel's family. Instead, as part of a public civil action brought by the labor ministry, it will be deposited into a worker assistance fund. The judge, José Augusto Segundo Neto, framed the ruling around what he called damage to the work environment itself—a right belonging to all people, indivisible and essential to quality of life. The amount equals twice what the municipality's comptroller had assessed as the financial harm.
The case has exposed what prosecutors describe as structural discrimination embedded in domestic labor relations in Brazil. The labor ministry's complaint pointed to practices, habits, and attitudes woven into custom that promote segregation and prejudice against domestic workers. Côrte Real and Hacker can appeal to a regional labor tribunal. Their lawyer, Ricardo Varjal, said his clients had not yet been formally notified of the decision.
What happened on that June afternoon emerged from security footage and police investigation. Mirtes had asked Côrte Real to watch Miguel while she took the dog out. The boy repeatedly tried to enter the elevator alone. Côrte Real stopped him four times—twice from a social elevator, twice from a service elevator. On the fifth attempt, she let him go. The elevator left the fifth floor, where they had been, descended to the second floor, then rose to the ninth. Miguel got out, opened a fire door, walked to a window, climbed onto an aluminum structure that was not designed as a protective barrier, and fell thirty-five meters to the ground. There were no screens on the windows. Less than a minute elapsed from the moment he left the elevator to the moment he hit the pavement.
In her statement to police, Côrte Real said she had been confused when her own daughter called to her, and that was why she let the elevator door close. The investigating detective, Ramon Teixeira, concluded otherwise. Security footage showed her deliberately pressing the button for the top floor and allowing the boy to enter alone. After the elevator closed, she returned to the apartment to continue getting her nails done. She could have watched the floor indicator to track where the elevator went with the child inside. She did not. Forensic analysis confirmed she had pressed the button for the penthouse level, though she claimed she had only pretended to do so.
The detective theorized that after removing Miguel from the elevator four times—twice from different elevators—Côrte Real had acted out of irritation or fatigue. The evidence suggested conscious abandonment rather than accident. She was arrested at the scene on suspicion of culpable homicide, released the same day after posting a 20,000-real bail, and is now facing charges of abandonment of a minor resulting in death. That charge carries a sentence of four to twelve years in prison. Prosecutors have also invoked aggravating circumstances because the crime occurred during the pandemic. The criminal trial has begun; witnesses were first heard in December 2020. Côrte Real has not yet been interrogated, and no trial date has been set.
The labor court's decision represents a separate legal reckoning. It acknowledges that what happened to Miguel was not merely a family tragedy but a failure of the system that employs domestic workers—a system in which a five-year-old could be left unattended in an elevator in a building with open windows, in which his mother's wages were paid by the municipality while she worked in a private home, in which the people responsible for his safety faced no immediate legal obligation to provide it. The ruling sends the damages not to his mother but into a collective fund, a gesture toward the broader harm done to all workers in similar positions.
Notable Quotes
She could have watched the floor indicator to track where the elevator went with the child inside. She did not.— Detective Ramon Teixeira, investigating officer
The work environment is a right of all people, indivisible and essential to quality of life.— Judge José Augusto Segundo Neto, labor court ruling
The Hearth Conversation Another angle on the story
Why does the money go to a worker assistance fund instead of to Miguel's mother?
Because this was a public civil action brought by the labor ministry, not a suit by the family itself. The court treated it as harm to the entire system of domestic work, not just to one family. It's a way of saying this wasn't just negligence—it was a failure of the structures that govern how domestic workers are treated.
But Mirtes lost her son. Doesn't she need that money more than a fund does?
She does. And that's the tension the ruling exposes. The criminal case against Sarí is separate, and that's where questions of direct liability to the family might be addressed. But the labor court was looking at something broader—the fact that a domestic worker's child could be left unattended in an unsafe space while she worked.
The detective said Sarí was tired after removing Miguel from the elevator four times. Does that matter legally?
It matters for understanding intent. The difference between culpable homicide and abandonment hinges on whether she consciously chose to let him go alone. The detective concluded she did—that fatigue or irritation led to a deliberate act, not an accident. The video evidence supported that reading.
What strikes you most about the sequence of events?
That it took less than a minute. He got out on the ninth floor, found an open window, climbed onto an aluminum structure that wasn't meant to hold weight, and fell. There were no screens. No one else was on that floor. It was a cascade of small failures—each one survivable on its own, but together they were fatal.
Will this ruling change anything for domestic workers in Brazil?
That's the question the court seemed to be asking when it framed this as collective harm. The ruling names the discrimination embedded in how domestic work is organized. Whether it actually shifts practice is another matter. Appeals will likely follow.