Police investigated after Brazil killings

Authorities are investigating the alleged involvement of police officers in the brutal killings of seven residents of a poor neighbourhood in north-eastern Brazil.

Four women and three men were found shot to death on Thursday, just hours after they allegedly engaged in a heated altercation with an off-duty police officer in the outskirts of Recife, 1,400 miles northeast of Sao Paulo in Pernambuco state, authorities said.

The men and the women – ranging in age from 17 to 32 – were allegedly dragged from their homes, tortured, tied up, and then shot to death in execution-style killings, police said.

Witnesses told police that the victims were abducted by a group of about five heavily-armed gunmen hours after the altercation with the off-duty officer.

Last month in Rio de Janeiro, eight police officers were charged with murder in connection with the death-squad killings of 30 people in the city’s suburbs.