This Woman Rebuilt Her Life After Her Ex-Boyfriend Killed Her Children

At age 23, the Barbara Penna, from Goiás, tries to rebuild her life after the death of her two children in the crime that left her with 40% of her body burned🇧🇷 She became an activist against domestic violence, got married and gave birth to Luisa. The children’s father, a confessed murderer, has not yet been tried.

“I live one day at a time and as if it were the last, because I know that from one hour to another everything can end. I had every reason to never want a romantic relationship again. But I believe that my little angels, Isadora and Henrique, put Robson in my path. In addition to raising my self-esteem and helping with my recovery, he gave me what I always dreamed of: a family.

I found out I was pregnant with Luisa at five months of pregnancy. The tension was immense. She had already undergone more than 200 surgeries and there were several more to be done. Our financial condition didn’t help either. Eating toast, in those days, was a luxury. I had very strong and contradictory emotions. I was nervous because I had gone to the Forum for the hearing of the confessed murderer of my children. Remembering details of everything that happened hurt me so much, so much so that, days before I found out I was expecting a baby, I tried to kill myself by taking medication. But luckily I survived and I’m here. Luisa was born in November 2015, two years after her brothers died. I still hadn’t spoken publicly about her arrival or that I got married due to legal advice.

Who killed my little angels was their father, my ex-boyfriend, João Moojen Neto. I was 19 and he was 22. João used to beat me and I never found support from anyone to denounce him. On the contrary, people only discouraged me, including my relatives. We were already separated when everything happened. He lived with his paternal grandmother, as he had been kicked out of the house by his mother, and I continued to live with his family. He used drugs, but he wasn’t a drug addict. So much so that the expertise found that he was aware of what he did.

Before the crime, João told me that he wanted to see our children and I believed him. Since I always thought I couldn’t deprive them of living with their father and thought he had to mature and assume his responsibilities, I took them to meet him. Isadora and Henrique were watching cartoons and fell asleep in the bedroom. John left without saying where he was going. He came back different, kind of weird. I said, ‘I can’t believe he’s back on drugs. For that, you are not addicted. I don’t react because you don’t change’. We started to argue, but I said I didn’t want to fight and decided to sleep right there, on the sofa bed. THEI woke up a while later with João beating me, screaming that he was going to kill me. It was desperate. There was only the computer screen lit. He is almost 2 meters tall, dragging me by my hair and banging my head on the floor. I couldn’t get away. I passed out.

When I regained consciousness, I smelled a strong smell of alcohol and realized that I was being burned alive. I got up and tried to escape. It didn’t help. Joao pushed me five or six times into the fire. When I ran into the utility area to scream for help, he chased after me and threw me out of the third-story window. Downstairs, lying on the floor and in flames, I felt glass exploding on top of me. I thrashed around begging them to save my children. Isadora was 2 years old and Henrique was only 3 months old. As neighbors flocked to help me, João arrived unharmed. He tried to blame me by yelling that I had done it. But I shouted that it was him and the people wouldn’t let him get away.

I had 40% of my body burned. One of my ears melted, I lost 60% of vision in my right eye and half of my scalp. Since no more hair grows, I use a prosthesis. I broke my heels, ankles and knees. Three centimeters of the femur entered the pelvis, three vertebrae of the spine were crushed and there was a skull foundation. I had generalized infection and liver abscess; I almost didn’t need a transplant. I made several grafts. so I found out that my children had not resisted after almost four months of hospitalization, including 45 days of coma. Mr Ênio, who was 72 years old and lived in the building, tried to rescue them and also died.

This tragedy radically transformed me and made me an activist. I fight for justice, because João has not yet been judged, and also so that other women do not suffer like me. Many look to me on social media or in person asking for guidance. I have over 170k followers on Facebook and Instagram. With my partner’s support, I just created the Barbara Penna Institute, in Porto Alegre, where I live, focused on combating gender violence and women’s empowerment. We are going to offer victims the support I never had to leave an abusive relationship, bringing together different types of assistance – such as psychological, legal and professional training. We already have partnerships with sectors of public power and private initiative.

The path of destruction I already know. Now, I want to build, even though my path is difficult and full of ups and downs – because I still have to undergo several surgeries, I was recently threatened by a relative of my ex and I suffer a lot when I think about the future that was taken away from my children. My two little angels and Luisa are my oxygen. Just like Robson, they give me strength. I feel that being alive today is a miracle and I try to focus on good things. Luisa motivates me because she is happy at any time of the day or night. Together we dance, draw, watch cartoons. It’s a glue that seems from another life. I want my daughter and the other girls to grow up knowing that they have to make their own decisions, that they deserve respect and that they shouldn’t let other people stop them from realizing their dreams.”