Melqui Galvão Enters Formal Interrogation Phase in São Paulo — What Happens Next in Brazil's Criminal Process

When Melqui Galvão was transferred to a civil police prison in São Paulo on May 10, the jiu-jitsu world watched a case move into territory that most of the sport had never seen at this scale before. By May 12 — just 20 days ago now — the case against him had crossed a critical threshold in Brazil's legal system: formal interrogation. That's the moment where the preliminary investigation phase closes, the accused sits across from investigators with counsel present, and everything said becomes part of the official record. For anyone tracking what happens next, understanding how Brazilian criminal procedure actually works is the only way to make sense of what's coming.

For context, since BJJ doesn't exactly run continuing legal education seminars: Brazilian criminal procedure doesn't charge you on arrest. The case opens with an inquérito policial — a police investigation that gathers evidence and builds the record before any charges are filed. Formal interrogation signals that investigative phase is complete enough to move forward. After the interrogation is concluded and documented, the Ministério Público — Brazil's public prosecutor's office — then decides whether to file a denúncia, or formal charges, with the court. The court handling this specific case specializes in crimes against children and adolescents, which tells you something about how serious the allegations are categorized at the institutional level.

If charges are filed and a trial runs its course, Galvão faces over 15 years under Article 217-A of the Brazilian Penal Code alone — the statute covering sexual acts with a vulnerable person under 14. That's not an outlier number or a prosecutor's opening gambit. There's a 12-year-old identified as an alleged victim. There's a 17-year-old athlete who was allegedly assaulted during a jiu-jitsu competition trip to Italy in February 2026. As the inquiry expanded, a third victim was identified. His lawyer, Átila Machado, has denied all accusations and stated that Galvão is cooperating with the process. He's cooperating formally now, under that specialized court's jurisdiction.

The timeline leading to that May 12 interrogation tells the story of how quickly things moved once the criminal system took hold:

In February 2026, the alleged assault of a 17-year-old athlete occurred during competition travel to Italy. Nothing public happened then. By April 23, an arrest warrant was issued. On April 28, Galvão self-surrendered to police in Manaus rather than wait for arrest. The very next day, April 29, the IBJJF and CBJJ announced permanent bans — both organizations moving faster than they typically do in these situations, issuing the bans before any formal charges had even been filed. By May 10, Galvão was transferred from Manaus to a civil police prison in northern São Paulo, placed under the jurisdiction of the investigating authority: the 8th Women's Defense Police Station, or DDM (Delegacia de Defesa da Mulher) in Portuguese. That transfer wasn't just a logistics decision. The DDM in São Paulo built this case from the beginning. Moving Galvão into their jurisdiction put him in the same physical and administrative space as the investigators who were constructing the charges against him.

Then came May 12, and formal interrogation began.

Brazil's temporary arrest warrants run 30 days before they require renewal or conversion to a pre-trial detention order. That 30-day window from the May 10 transfer was closing as interrogation happened. A judge will decide soon whether to keep Galvão detained while charges proceed, or release him pending trial. The formal interrogation — what he says, how he responds, what details he provides or refuses to address — feeds directly into that judicial decision. It's not just an evidentiary step. It's the moment where a judge starts assessing whether someone should remain in custody.

Beyond the courtroom mechanics, the Brazilian jiu-jitsu community's response has been notable, if only because it shows how differently institutions moved in this case compared to prior situations. The IBJJF and CBJJ issued permanent bans before conviction, before formal charges, before the interrogation that just happened. That's unusual for the sport. They were signaling something: this case was different. Mica Galvão, who shares a surname but no relationship with Melqui, felt the need to issue a public statement clarifying the distinction. Amit Elor, who had trained under Melqui Galvão and been publicly associated with him in competition coverage, released a video urging potential victims to come forward. Diogo Reis also publicly distanced himself from the situation. The speed and scope of those responses — from multiple athletes and organizations — created a different social context than the sport usually generates around allegations.

That context matters because BJJ's institutional track record on this issue is genuinely poor. The André Galvão sexual misconduct investigation in San Diego was closed for "insufficient evidence" without charges ever being filed, and the matter essentially disappeared from the sport's public discourse. In the Jay Rodriguez situation at Simple Man in 2025, a formal ban issued in May was followed by video evidence of him training at the same gym seven months later, with leadership calling it outside "public hours" — a response that made the ban look more symbolic than actual. The sport has a pattern of moving slowly, then backing away, then calling things resolved without resolution.

The Melqui Galvão case is moving through a different system. It's inside a criminal justice apparatus with multiple identified victims, a detained suspect in official custody, a specialized court that handles nothing but crimes against children and adolescents, and now a formal interrogation phase that feeds into charging decisions. That's not the kind of institutional machinery you walk back with a non-denial statement or a clarifying video. The Brazilian legal system isn't designed to accept that kind of half-measure resolution.

One detail adds another layer to this: Galvão was a civil police investigator in Brazil before jiu-jitsu. He worked inside this exact system. He knew what an interrogation room looked like from the investigator's side of the table. He understood the procedures, the evidence standards, the way statements get recorded and used. That prior career gave him credibility and institutional knowledge. It also gave him access — access that allowed him to build a coaching reputation, to participate in IBJJF-sanctioned events, to travel with athletes on competition trips. That same access is now central to the allegations. The young athletes identified as alleged victims came into contact with him because he was positioned as a credible, authorized figure in the sport.

And now he's sitting in an interrogation room being run by the same institution he once worked for, answering questions from investigators using procedures he once executed as part of his professional life. The transfer to São Paulo on May 10 wasn't random. It put him back inside his former workplace, under different circumstances.

The Brazilian legal system isn't giving that credibility or access back. The formal interrogation that began on May 12 was a step toward charges. Those charges, if filed, will move into a trial process where the specialized court for crimes against children will determine guilt or innocence. That's not a process that typically ends with the defendant walking free unless evidence fails to support the allegations beyond reasonable doubt — and the fact that multiple alleged victims exist, that competition travel records exist, and that the case moved from police investigation to formal interrogation suggests the evidence gathered so far has met at least the preliminary threshold for moving forward.

The sport gave Galvão competition results, coaching credentials, and the access that came with IBJJF event participation. That access is now the core of what he's being held accountable for. Twenty days have passed since formal interrogation began. The next phase — the prosecutor's decision to file formal charges, the judge's detention ruling, the possible release or continued imprisonment pending trial — will come within weeks, not months. And unlike prior cases in jiu-jitsu where allegations faded or institutions stepped back, this one is running inside a criminal courtroom with evidence, named victims, and a judiciary focused specifically on crimes against children.

The Brazilian legal system has taken hold. And it's not letting go based on how a gym decides to schedule training or how a governing body decides to word a statement.

This post was generated by AI. Sources are linked below. Follow @bjj-problems on YouTube for the weekly video digest.

Sources

• Melqui Galvao Transferred To Sao Paulo
• Top BJJ coach Melqui Galvao arrested for alleged sexual assault of minors, banned from IBJJF — Yahoo Sports
• Exclusive: Melqui Galvao Allegedly Arrested Under Suspicion of Committing a Crime Against a Minor — BJJDoc
• Mica Galvao, Amit Elor and Diogo Reis Issue Statements Distancing Themselves From Melqui Galvao — BJJDoc
• Top BJJ Coach Melqui Galvão Arrested Amid Allegations Involving Minors — BJJEE