Frederico Cunha

[2] Dom Teodoro de Faria, the bishop of Funchal, who had met Frederico Cunha in Rome, made him his private secretary.

Catarino said that Father Frederico's bizarre behavior often attracted attention: he had a taste for skulls, which he wore on his coat or hanged from his belt.

[10][11][5]According to the Prosecution of the Public Ministry, on May 1, 1992, Cunha met Luís Miguel Escórcio Correia, a 15-year-old boy who was walking on foot along the road to Caniçal, offering him a ride in his black Volkswagen.

Luís Miguel's body was later found at the bottom of the Caniçal cliff, at Ponta de São Lourenço, on the eastern end of Madeira, with signs of sexual abuse.

It was initially deemed an accident, but following the autopsy performed by coroner Emanuel Pita, several injuries, including one to the head, were discovered and determined to have originated prior to the fall.

[13] In a subsequent search of his home, authorities found an abundance of photographs showing Frederico abusing young and adolescent boys.

[14] Father Frederico himself, in an interview with the Jornal de Madeira, compared himself to Jesus Christ, saying that, like the son of God, he was a "victim of injustice and absurdity".

In 2010, in an interview with Público, the prosecutor João Freitas, himself a practising Catholic, publicly declared that he had been pressured on several occasions to rush the proceedings and force the acquittal of the accused.

On February 16, 2024, the Pope Francis finally decreed Father Frederico's "dismissal from the clerical state" and exempted him from the duty of celibacy.

According to the document, "Since the whereabouts of Mr. Frederico Cunha are unknown, the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith has ordered that the Holy Father's decision be made public on the diocese's official website."