Brazil: Gang launches second wave of deadly attacks

A notorious Brazilian criminal gang has unleashed a second wave of attacks against police, bringing to at least 52 the number of people killed in what one official called the deadliest assault of its kind in Brazil’s history.

Sao Paulo state government officials reported at least 100 separate attacks on Friday, Saturday and yesterday that killed at least 35 police officers, the girlfriend of one of them, two passers-by and 14 suspected gang members.

Yesterday, dozens of new prison rebellions also broke out, with 41 uprisings underway across Sao Paulo state in the afternoon. Inmates were holding more than 229 prison guards hostage.

Enio Lucciola, spokesman for the Sao Paulo State Public Safety Department, said the attacks and prison rebellions, planned by the First Capital Command, known by its Portuguese initials PCC, “were the most vicious and deadliest attacks on public security forces that have ever taken place in Brazil”.

The rebellious inmates, however, have not made any demands nor have they harmed any of their hostages, said Jorge de Souza, a press spokesman of the Sao Paulo Prison Affairs Department.

He said visiting relatives were inside several of the prisons but that “we don’t consider them hostages because they are there to show solidarity with their jailed relatives. They don’t want to leave.”

For Walter Fanganiello Maierovitch, an expert on organised crime and Brazil’s former drug czar, the PCC resorted to ”terrorist tactics”, launching attacks that were reminiscent of the violence seen daily in Baghdad, Iraq.

The attacks were in response to the transfer of several imprisoned PCC leaders, a practice authorities use to sever prisoners’ ties to gang members outside prison.

Eight PCC leaders were among 765 inmates transferred to a remote, high-security facility in the far western tip of Sao Paulo state.

Lucciola said authorities were prepared for some kind of PCC attack once the transfer of its leaders became known.

“But we never imagined it would be so big or ferocious,” he said. “It caught us by surprise.”

The attacks and ensuing gun battles wounded another 50 people – 36 policemen, eight bystanders and six suspects – the state government’s press office said in a statement.

At least 72 suspects, “all of them with long criminal records”, have been arrested, Lucciola said.

Authorities said police units were on maximum alert, and the federal government said it was ready to help the state with all means available.

Officers in bullet-proof vests set up checkpoints to search vehicles, and barriers were placed in front of many police stations to keep pedestrians and vehicles away.

Assailants also attacked patrol cars, bars where off-duty policemen gather, a courthouse and a highway police outpost on the outskirts of the city of Sao Paulo.

Local media reported that the assailants used guns, shotguns, grenades, machine guns and home-made bombs in the attacks in Sao Paulo city and its suburbs; coastal cities like Santos, Guaruja and Cubatao; and cities more than 300 kilometres away.

Yesterday morning, policemen were notably absent on Avenida Paulista, one of Sao Paulo’s most important thoroughfares.

“To tell you the truth I prefer it that way,” said Cristiane Teixeira, a 30-year-old news-stand employee.

”After what I read in the newspaper, I don’t think it’s very safe to be near a policeman because you may end up getting shot by people wanting to kill him.”

Witnesses to the killing of police officer Jose Antonio Martinez told the Folha Online news service that two men wearing face masks approached as the officer was dining with his wife, shot him several times in the head and ran. His wife was unhurt.

“We can’t let this pass,” Nilo Faria Hellmeister, a police officer and friend of Martinez told the news service. “We must adopt an incisive and extremely harsh attitude.”

A few miles away witnesses recalled how two groups of men bearing heavy calibre weapons appeared in front of a fire station and began shooting at random, killing a firefighter identified only as Alberto.

In Brazil, the fire department is part of the State Police and firefighters are also police officers.

Founded in 1993 by prisoners at the Taubate Penitentiary in Sao Paulo, the PCC is involved in drug and arms trafficking, kidnappings, bank robberies and prison breaks and rebellions, police say.

During a 10-day period in November 2003, the PCC attacked more than 50 police stations with machine guns, home-made bombs, shotguns and pistols, killing three officers and injuring 12. Two suspected gang members also were killed.

Those attacks apparently were planned by jailed PCC leaders trying to pressure authorities to improve prison conditions.

In February 2001, the PCC organised a prison uprising that spread to 28 other penitentiaries and jails across Sao Paulo state and resulted in the death of 19 inmates.

“The PCC has declared war on the State of Sao Paulo,” Maierovitch said in an article published Sunday in the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper. “Like fundamentalist terrorist organisations and the mafia, the PCC uses attacks and then goes into hiding, lulling authorities into a false sense of security.”