Brazilian woman who is 38 accused of years of ‘elaborate fraud schemes’ by posing as a child

The Guardian reports that Amanda Maria Souza de Oliveira, a 38-year-old Brazilian woman, has been arrested in Santa Catarina state and charged with fraud and false identity offences after allegedly posing as a 12-year-old girl to live with a family for nearly 16 months, during which they paid all her expenses and celebrated her purported birthday. The article is well-sourced with named officials (prosecutor Viviane Soares, her lawyer Rafael Luiz Siewert), specific details about the deception (the church meeting, her fabricated abuse narrative, how suspicions arose), and contextualizes this as part of an alleged pattern spanning multiple states since the late 2000s. Multiple independent outlets (Daily Express, AOL, Times of India) corroborate the core facts, though some sources report her age as 37 rather than 38—a minor discrepancy that could reflect arrest record versus birthdate differences. The reporting includes the key development that her lawyer has requested psychiatric evaluation and proceedings are suspended pending fitness assessment, with her remaining in custody.