ATTA BOY BRAZIL!! Next up..Gangs in Chicago!!

[Bullfighter]

Police keep drug traffickers under siege in Rio's favelas

AP - Police and soldiers kept one of Rio’s most dangerous slums under siege early Sunday, blocking entrances to hillside alleyways with armoured cars and warning gang members barricaded inside that they were ready to take the shantytown by force.

Nightfall on Saturday marked the end of a surrender deadline offered to gunmen hiding in the maze of tiny shacks, but authorities gave no indication of when they might move against the estimated 600 gang members thought to be trapped.

A police spokesman emphasized the superior night-fighting capabilities of the troops and police who had surrounded Alemao since Friday, although a police battalion commander indicated any major assault probably would come during daytime.

In a week of widespread violence blamed on the city’s drug gangs, authorities on Thursday seized one slum once thought virtually impenetrable. More than 200 armed gang members fled that offensive and ran to the nearby Alemao complex of a dozen slums that are home to at least 85,000 people, followed by security forces on Friday.

Hundreds of soldiers in camouflage, black-clad police from elite units and regular police manned positions around Alemao, sheltering behind armoured vehicles. They exchanged intermittent, heavy gunfire with gang members at many of the 44 entrances to the slum, its shacks packed along steep hills.

Many residents of Alemao streamed down the narrow alleyways Saturday carrying their belongings - chairs, washing machines, bags of clothing - hoping to avoid being caught in the crossfire of the looming invasion.

Police spokesman Henrique Lima Castro Saraiva said during the afternoon that the deadline for the gang members to surrender was “when the sun sets.”

“We want them to turn themselves in peacefully,” he said. “We do not want a bloodbath, but if they call us to war we will respond with force.”

Saraiva said the gunmen would be no match for security forces in a pitched battle, saying they were “exhausted, hungry, thirsty, stressed out” and had not been able to bring in more ammunition.

He also said the soldiers and police were trained and equipped to fight at night. “We have superior manpower and firepower, and night-time favours us not them,” he said.

A police battalion commander, however, said fighting would come during daylight.

“The probability of that being done is zero,” commander Waldir Pires told reporters outside the slum when asked about a big night invasion.

He did not rule out smaller night-time incursions into the slum, and the Globo television network reported that at least one armoured vehicle was inside Alemao soon after night fell.

It was not clear how many gang members turned themselves over to police, though by mid-afternoon 16 men had accepted the police offer. One of them was allegedly the right-hand man to the leader of Alemao’s drug traffickers, said Allan Turnowski, the chief of the investigative branch of the police. Two other men were shot and arrested as they tried to escape.

Six wives or girlfriends of traffickers also had been arrested, Turnowski said. Ten inmates suspected of orchestrating vehicle burnings and mass robberies early in the week in a campaign meant to scare residents and warn law enforcement away from their turf were transferred to federal, maximum security prisons away from Rio, according to a spokesman for the Rio state public safety department.

The faceoff at Alemao comes after a week of widespread violence in Rio, with more than 100 cars and buses set on fire and at least 35 deaths, mostly suspected traffickers.

Authorities say the gangs are lashing back against a 2-year-old police campaign that has pushed criminals out of slums where they have long ruled with impunity. It’s an effort to secure Rio before the city hosts the finals of the 2014 World Cup and the 2016 Olympics.

Rio de Janeiro’s governor, Sergio Cabral, has vowed repeatedly to break the back of drug gangs that have ruled hundreds of shantytowns in the city of 6 million people.

Vila Cruzeiro, a slum neighbouring Alemao, was occupied by police Thursday.

A man who was born and raised in Vila Cruzeiro and still lives there with his mother welcomed officers when they took the hillside. He wants them to set up permanent posts to keep control of the community.

“Those of us who work, who are not involved with the (drug) traffic, we have nothing to fear,” said the man, who didn’t want to be identified for fear of retaliation, because he wasn’t sure law enforcement would be able to hold on.

The human rights organization Amnesty International complained that police had been too heavy-handed in their offensive, but many Rio residents seemed to welcome the aggressive stance. People applauded as armoured vehicles rolled by and voiced hope that a new push would reclaim areas of their city that had been lawless for years.

Cabral, the governor, said police taking Vila Cruzeiro was a sign of a new Rio. “We have demonstrated to those who don’t respect the law ... the pre-eminence of a democratic state governed by the law,” he said

.http://www.france24.com/en/20101128...de-janeiro-favelas-brazil-olympics-violence--

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ATTA BOY BRAZIL!

Should have done that in Chicago years ago. There's nothing like dead bodies lying on the streets to inspire kids to stay out of gangs. This will be happening in the US sooner or later.

But I guess Chicago would be forced to do it if they won the bid for the Olympics.

 

[waltky]

Cops vs. gangs in Brazil...

Reports: 31 dead over weekend in Sao Paulo
Nov 12,`12 -- Brazilian media are reporting that at least 31 people have been murdered in Sao Paulo in the last three days.

A police spokeswoman says the reported figure is accurate, though she says she has no official statistics. Early Monday, at least one bus torched was torched in the city.

Police say that a powerful drug gang is behind the wave of violence that's hit South America's biggest city in recent weeks.

They say it's in response to a crackdown on the First Capital Command drug gang, which was allegedly behind a wave of violence that paralyzed the city in 2006.

More than 90 police have been murdered since the start of the year in Sao Paulo. Authorities blame the gang for those deaths.

Source

See also:

Sao Paulo gripped by violence as scores die in war between police and gangsters
Tue, Nov 13, 2012 - It was a more than typically murderous Saturday night in Sao Paulo: At 10pm, in the Sao Bernardo do Campo neighborhood, a motorcyclist rode up to a private home, killed two of the residents, then sped away. An hour or so later in a nearby district, police shot and killed two men in what they said was an exchange of fire. Elsewhere, police found the body of a man with a bullet through his brain — one of 14 people murdered and 12 injured in this single night amid a rising wave of violence in Brazil’s biggest city.

At least 140 people have been murdered in Sao Paulo over the past two weeks in an outbreak of violent crime that has prompted early school closures, a change of municipal bus routes and street demonstrations. In September, 144 people were killed. The causes are manifold, but a major factor appears to be an undeclared war between the largest criminal militia and the police, which has led to drive-by shootings, ambushes and other killings. After initially denying the link, officials from the public safety department told newspapers over the weekend that many of the killings of officers had been ordered by imprisoned leaders of the First Capital Command criminal gang in reprisal for a crackdown on the drug trade.

However, non-governmental organizations say the responsibility also lies with militias formed by former and serving police officers, who are used to skimming profits off the drug trade. So far this year, 92 former and current police officers have been gunned down. Last week, state and federal police said they would combine forces to create a new intelligence agency to counter the resurgent threat posed by organized crime. Police jitters were apparent on Friday night, when an off-duty officer, Edcarlos Lima, killed the driver and passenger of a car that swerved in front of him. He claimed to have seen a gun in the vehicle and feared he was being corralled for a possible hit. However, witnesses and the victims’ families say he needlessly killed two innocents. Lima is now under investigation.

There were 982 murders in the first nine months of this year in Sao Paulo, according to public security department data. This is up 10 percent over last year and higher than the total in Rio de Janeiro. Five hundred angry residents of Brasilandia — one of the worst-affected areas — took to the streets on Sunday morning, carrying white roses, wearing T-shirts printed with the faces of some of the victims and shouting for greater vigilance. Schools and shops in some Sao Paulo districts shut early last week due to concerns about rising risks. “In view of the wave of violence in the city’s south zone, the school’s directors decided to send staff and students home early so as to assure their safety,” Eliane Valerio de Souza, administrative assistant at a professional training school, told the newspaper Folha de S Paulo.

Regional authorities have played down the violence. Sao Paulo State Governor Geraldo Alckmin said the crime rate in Greater Sao Paulo was on the wane. However, he said the problem would not go away unless the national government took firmer measures to control the influx of drugs and guns along Brazil’s extensive borders. Despite the recent killings, Sao Paulo State is by no means the most violent in Brazil when its huge population is taken into account. Last year, the commercial powerhouse saw 10.1 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants, compared with 74.5 in the most murderous state, Alagoas.

Sao Paulo gripped by violence as scores die in war between police and gangsters - Taipei Times