A woman plagued by epilepsy after a childhood car crash travelled to Brazil seeking a miracle cure from a notorious faith healer – only to later die from the condition after she returned home to England.
Magdalen Merivale’s family raised thousands of pounds to send her to self-proclaimed ‘psychic surgeon’ João Teixeira de Faria – who is widely known as ‘John of God’ – believing she could finally be healed by his ‘wonderful divine magic’.
But just months after they launched a crowdfunding appeal, the pseudo guru was globally exposed as a fraud, arrested and accused of sexually abusing more than 600 women.
Faria – who gained international exposure in 2010 when Oprah Winfrey visited his retreat – is now serving more than 118 years in prison for multiple rapes.
Before his downfall, millions of visitors travelled from around the world to Faria’s healing centre in the remote town of Abadiania in central Brazil.
His fame was boosted by celebrity visitors including pop star Paul Simon, supermodel Naomi Campbell, Hollywood legend Shirley MacLaine while the guru claimed on his website that he had treated former US president Bill Clinton along with an ex-president of Brazil.
And Magdalen and her family now also appear to be among those duped by Faria, 83, whose healing treatments have since been likened to ‘nothing more than carnival tricks’.
The depraved conman – who has since been exposed in a Netflix documentary series – is said to have earned tens of millions of pounds offering hope that his unconventional methods could cure diseases like cancer and HIV.
Magdalen Merivale’s (pictured) family raised thousands of pounds to send her to self-proclaimed ‘psychic surgeon’ João Teixeira de Faria – who is widely known as ‘John of God’
Faria – who gained international exposure in 2010 when Oprah Winfrey visited his retreat – is now serving more than 118 years in prison for multiple rapes
An inquest into her death this week heard how Magdalen, 37, had suffered an epileptic fit at some point during the night on November 20 last year.
She was found dead in her bed the following morning by her distraught mother Pippa at the family’s £1.2m flat near Notting Hill, west London.
The hearing at Inner West London Coroner’s Court heard how Magdalen had developed post traumatic epilepsy years after being hit by a car as a youngster in 1993.
Magdalen was aged just six when the near-fatal accident happened and she suffered a traumatic brain injury.
She underwent several operations, needing metal plates to fortify her skull, and years later, aged 21, she began suffering epilepsy which experts said had been brought on by the original impact.
The trauma had a devastating impact on her life and Pippa, who is herself a healer, turned to Faria in desperation.
Their tragic backstory was not outlined at the inquest but the Daily Mail can reveal how Magdalen and her family were convinced Faria had the power to work miracles.
In 2016, Magdalen and her mother Pippa travelled to Brazil and spent a ‘few short days’ in Abadiania.
In December that year, Pippa, 76, launched a GoFundMe appeal in a bid to raise £8,000 so she could get her daughter ‘back to Abadiania as soon as possible, and complete what we have started’.
Pippa said of the trip: ’In those few days some wonderful divine magic did happen, even though we discovered that a minimum of three weeks is vital.
‘The seizures are now much shorter in duration and she recovers much faster. The change is dramatic, but not yet complete.’
She said that since Magdalen’s accident she had ‘achieved miracles that were believed to be impossible’ during her ’23-year healing journey’.
But she added: ‘The most advanced healers on the planet have been unable to fully heal one final piece – yet.’
Outlining Magdalen’s struggles she wrote: ‘Around 4.5 years ago, she began suffering severe seizures.
‘They have made it impossible for her to hold a job down, to study, to lead any kind of ordinary life.
‘They have also required me to radically restructure my healing work which is our sole income source, since my husband and I found ourselves in a joint carer role around the clock.
‘Magdalen has explored the medical route: an honest and kind neurologist guided her through several medications and when they made her condition considerably more dangerous, he explained that for some people, medication exacerbates the situation.’
Magdalen was aged just six when the near-fatal accident happened and she suffered a traumatic brain injury. Pictured: Magdalen and her mum Pippa
Describing her mission she added: ‘The urgent project: to get her back to Abadiania as soon as possible, and complete what we have started. It won’t take huge funds to achieve this, but we don’t have them.’
She explained the money raised would be spent on ‘two airfares from London to Brasilia, taxi rides to and from the airport to Abadiania, and three weeks in a ‘Pousada’, which is a small B&B in the local village, and our home rent covered while we’re away’.
The aim of the trip, she said, was ‘to reach the point where the accident never happened.’
Although falling short of the target, the appeal raised £2,405, Pippa went on to thank people who had donated in an update in April 2017.
She wrote: ‘An overdue, and massive, THANK YOU to all you utterly wonderful people who helped to make the real, long-promised miracles happen.’
She posted a photo of Magdalen taken ‘shortly after John of God’s intervention’.
Pippa wrote: ‘Early days in an extraordinary process.
‘Much has happened since, and she’s physically very frail after ‘climbing Everest’ as her healer describes it, many hundreds of times, but the fundamental shift is what we prayed for all those years and few believed possible. There aren’t words for her gratitude or ours.’
She told how Magdalen hoped to return to Abadiania ‘for convalescence and rebuilding’ and of her daughter’s hopes to ‘train in possibly law with human rights but more likely nursing, soon as she’s strong enough’.
However, Magdalen’s inquest heard that she told doctors in August 2019 that she was still suffering two or three seizures a month.
She had been prescribed several drugs for the condition but had suffered severe side effects so didn’t continue to take them.
At a consultation in May last year ‘the increased risk of death or injury was explained to her as she wasn’t taking medication,’ the court heard.
On October 10 2024, Magdalen went to A&E following a seizure in a lecture theatre but was discharged after a period of monitoring and a scan that showed nothing untoward.
In a statement read to the court, Pippa explained how the family had been to Kew Gardens in west London on the evening of November 20 2024, before they returned to their Kensington home, had dinner and went to bed.
At 9am the following morning she went to check on her daughter but assumed she was sleeping, before going to an osteopathic appointment, returning around 11.20am.
Magdalen underwent several operations, needing metal plates to fortify her skull, and years later, aged 21, she began suffering epilepsy which experts said had been brought on by the original impact
Assistant coroner Jean Harkin said: ‘She’d become alarmed as she hadn’t heard from her.
‘She went into her room and found her on her bed face down with her arms crossed under her body.
‘She called the GP who told her to do resuscitation but she was purple.’
London Ambulance Service (LAS) attended at noon and Magdalen’s death was confirmed.
A post mortem examination showed evidence of the old injury to her brain with a conclusion that death was from post traumatic epilepsy.
Recording a verdict of accidental death the coroner said: ’It’s clear from the evidence that the epilepsy started many years after the accident and it’s also clear from toxicology, neuropathology and the post mortem evidence that there was traumatic damage to the brain.’
She said that in ‘all likelihood’ this has resulted in ‘status epilepticus’ – a life-threatening medical emergency where a seizure lasts for five or more minutes, or where multiple seizures occur without the person regaining consciousness between them.
Faria, who had no medical training, described himself as a ‘simple farmer’ who was born into poverty and completed just two years of education before heading out on the road as ‘a travelling medicine man’.
He claimed to have been gifted with miraculous powers by the heavenly ‘entities’ that have been appearing to him since he was a child.
Working as a medium he set up his ‘spiritual hospital’ in the late 1970’s and it quickly became a booming shrine, retreat and tourist attraction.
His treatments included ‘psychic surgeries’ during which he would cut into people with knives without the use of anaesthetic.
While he did not charge a fee for his healings he welcomed donations and promised bonus miracles to generous benefactors as well as selling special ‘passionflower’ potions.
He also owned property in the town where visitors would stay.
Faria gained international exposure in 2013 when Oprah visited his retreat to interview him for her talk show.
In a since-deleted column on oprah.com, Ms Winfrey wrote that she was overwhelmed by the experience of seeing him cut into the breast of a woman without anaesthesia and that she left feeling ‘an overwhelming sense of peace’.
After the accusations against Faria became public, she stated that she hoped justice will be served.
Faria was first convicted for sexual assault in December 2019.
Faria – who was married several times and has had an unknown number of children from his different wives and affairs – has since been convicted of multiple charges of rape and sexual abuse, as well as firearms offences.
His accusers include one of his adult daughters Dalva Teixeira who came forward to tell how, under the pretence of mystical treatments, Faria abused and raped her between the ages of 10 and 14.
She said her father stopped after she became pregnant by one of his employees.
Ms Teixeira said she was beaten so severely by her father that she suffered a miscarriage adding: ‘My father is a monster.’
Prosecutors are said to be still investigating many other charges, including corruption and ideological falsehood, which he denies.
