José Arigó
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José (Zé) Arigó, born José Pedro de Freitas (18 October 1921 - 1 November 1971) was a Brazilian psychic surgeon. He performed his healing acts and surgical operations with his hands or with simple kitchen utensils while in a mediunic trance, supposedly channeling the spirit of Dr. Adolf Fritz.
[edit] Biography
Zé Arigó was born José Pedro de Freitas on a farm located 6 kilometers from Congonhas, in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. His family was very poor and he could only study up to the third grade of [primary school]school. At the age of 14 he began working at a mine where he worked for 6 years. According to his autobiography, around 1950 he began to suffer from strong headaches, insomnia, trances, and hallucinations. One day he felt that the voice that had been pursuing him took over his body, and he had a vision of a bald man, dressed in a white apron and supervising a team of doctors and nurses in an enormous operating room. This entity identified itself as "Dr. Fritz."
After claiming to have channeled Dr. Fritz, Arigó began to perform operations using scalpels and needles. His reputation soared and spread throughout Brazil after it was alleged that he had removed a cancerous tumor from the lung of a well-known Brazilian senator. Over the next twenty years, thousands of people who mistrusted traditional medicine, or had not found help in it, came to Congonhas in search of a cure.
In 1956 Arigó was prosecuted by the medical association of Minas Gerais, for the crime of quackery (curandeirismo). He was sentenced to 15 months in prison, but was pardoned by President Juscelino Kubitschek de Oliveira. In 1962 he was arrested and held for seven months for practicing medicine without a license. Despite the problems with the authorities, his fame continued to increase, and in 1963 he was received by President João Goulart. He also allegedly cured the daughter of Brazilian President, João Figueiredo.
Arigó died in 1971, in an automobile accident.
