Nicholas Meregali used his public platform to call for information related to the case of Melquizedec de Lima Galvão Ferreira, the jiu-jitsu coach and civil police investigator known as Melqui Galvão, who was arrested in Manaus, Amazonas following allegations of assault involving a 17-year-old athlete. What followed over the next 48 hours left Meregali visibly shaken and emotionally drained in ways he said he was not prepared for.
In a deeply personal video addressed to his followers, Nicholas Meregali described the flood of women who reached out through his Instagram after his initial post.
“Frightening, the number of people who were filtered in the last 48 hours through my Instagram,” he said. “Unfortunately, we managed to find many people who were willing to talk, not all of them to testify, but a large part of them are testifying.”
What made it worse, he explained, was that the responses did not stop with Melqui Galvão. Women began sharing experiences connected to other figures within the sport, individuals who had publicly posted statements of condemnation or clarification in the days following Galvão’s arrest.
“We also found people connected to others who are also part of this whole situation, who post a lot about clarification notes, talk about this and that, that they repudiate actions, etc. Many of those people are also part of it, and it is sad,” Meregali said.
The weight of what he was reading, message after message from women describing assaults they said took place when they were children, proved to be more than he had anticipated.
“I do not know how women who work with this daily, who compete literally in the trenches and without any support, manage to get through it, to live life forward,” he said. “Talking with women who were assaulted, abused, at 12, 13, 14, 10 years old, which is what I read on my Instagram for 48 hours, it is frightening, it drains you. I feel like my heart is on the floor.”
Nicholas Meregali acknowledged the limits of what he could continue to do.
“I am stepping back now. I cannot handle this situation anymore. I do not have the experience, the heart, the spirit, I do not know how to deal with this,” he said. “I am only a jiu-jitsu competitor. I think we need to seek more qualified people, and now I am pulling my team off the field.”
The station can be reached at +55 11 2742-1701.He offered one final acknowledgment before closing.
“Congratulations, you all are incredibly strong,” he said. “And I am stepping back now.”
