Alex Marangon and Ayahuasca: Two Colombian curanderos summoned to “provide their version of his death”

The investigations into the death of Alex Marangon. More than a month after the discovery of the body of the Venetian bartenderthe Carabinieri of Treviso have requested, through the Spanish lawyer Oscar Palet Santandreu, to be able to hear Jhonni Benavides and Sebastian Castillo, the two shamans guests at the Music and Medicine ceremony at the Santa Bona Abbey in Vidor where Alex disappeared on the evening of June 29-30. They are the only eyewitnesses not to have been heard by the Prosecutor’s Office, and they are crucial because they were the last to have seen Alex alive. It has not been made known whether they will be heard via the web, with a video link in the presence of a translator, or by “rogatory” to the embassy of the countries where they are located, or through a written statement.

Jhonni Benavides, Colombian healer and shaman, active on social media, praises herbal teas and ayahuasca infusions. “For me – he explains in the videos (one of which was posted a day after Alex’s body was found) – ayahuasca is a master plant that gives us the opportunity to enter an informational field for our personal growth. In my way of feeling this medicine has the ability to unite all the arts of life and teaches us the art of good living”.

Benavidesguest in Italy of a shamanic tour that was supposed to last for weeks, from the morning of June 30 but he has become untraceablemaking his voice heard again on July 14 through his defender, the Spanish lawyer Oscar Palet Santandreu.

“At a certain point in the ritual my clients noticed that Alex was confused, suddenly he got up and ran outside – explained Santandreu – Jhonni looked for the translator because they didn’t understand what Alex was saying. They followed him but immediately lost sight of him in the dark: it’s not true that they were alone. They heard a scream and immediately after they went out to look for him, five of them, then together with the rest of the group. The area was dark and they didn’t know it. They didn’t know if he had gone into the woods, or fallen.. They didn’t hear any noise of falling into the water.”

The two curanderos have always denied using ayahuasca, an Amazonian herb banned in Italy since 2023. To ascertain this point, hair tests are being carried out: it appears that all participants have given their consent to the examination. The test aims to establish, by comparing the growth with the substances found, whether the person had a habit of using drugs and whether psychotropic substances had been taken on the day of the ceremony.

Alex Marangon’s parents, meanwhile, continue to ask through public meetings and demonstrations that the spotlight not be turned off on the affair. And the family’s lawyers, Stefano Tigani and Nicodemo Gentile, recipients of a very detailed anonymous letter in the last week, ask that “whoever knows, do their duty as citizens, and collaborate with the investigations”