
Rio de Janeiro’s police killed a record number of people in three months - egusa
https://latinamericareports.com/rio-de-janeiro-police-kill-434-record-number/1958/
======
hazdiego
Ironically, Rio de Janeiro is considered one of the safest capitals in Brazil
[1]. The absolute numbers are high, but that's a huge city with millions of
habitants.

I lived there for 27 years in favelas like Rocinha and Santa Marta (when I
didn't have money), and in apartments in Botafogo and Flamengo (after making
money). I walked on the streets midnight and later. Nothing has ever happened
to me. I've never even witnessed anything.

Of course, it's my own experience and I have some privileges.

The only time I was robbed in my life I was in the US. My computer has been
stolen in the Houston International Airport (thankfully, it was recovered by a
super professional Mexican police officer).

[1] [https://thebrazilbusiness.com/article/the-10-safest-state-
ca...](https://thebrazilbusiness.com/article/the-10-safest-state-capitals-in-
brazil)

~~~
coldtea
> _Ironically, Rio de Janeiro is considered one of the safest capitals in
> Brazil [1]. The absolute numbers are high, but that 's a huge city with
> millions of habitants._

Rio police are also globally considered fascist butchers... with frequent news
stories of indiscriminately killing favela residents, kids, etc.

[https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/08/16/police-killings-are-
out-...](https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/08/16/police-killings-are-out-control-
rio-de-janeiro)

[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/14/brazil-13-dead...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/feb/14/brazil-13-dead-
gang-policy-shoot-to-kill-rio)

[https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/30/brazil-rio-
pol...](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/30/brazil-rio-police-
arrested-video-altering-crime-scene)

[https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2018/07/brazil-
police...](https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2018/07/brazil-police-
killings-of-black-youths-continue-25-years-after-the-candelaria-massacre/)

[https://www.humanium.org/en/children-victims-violence-
brazil...](https://www.humanium.org/en/children-victims-violence-brazil/)

[https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/22/world/americas/police-
kil...](https://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/22/world/americas/police-killings-
brazil-rio.html)

~~~
hazdiego
I agree. My post is more in the direction of "the violence practiced by the
police is disproportionate to the real violence of the city".

Although I never suffered anything from the police either (maybe because I'm
not black and didn't look poor when I was poor), I've seen a bunch of racist
approaches from them in many situations.

Of course, it's based on my own experience (27 years living there) and
statistics I find on the internet (which may not count the violence that
happens deeper in the favelas).

------
brutally-honest
Just posting this here in reply to a comment whose thread was flagged. Context
is "whose definition of criminal should we use".

How about "people openly flaunting assault weapons"? As someone who lived in
Rio most of their life, I think that's a good line to draw. Opinions filled
with "human rights" concerns from people far removed are probably ethically
and morally correct, which is... cute.

We're fighting an Urban War over here. This is a Concrete Jungle. This is a
crazy post-apocalyptic situation to which most people in Rio grew accustomed
to while most people outside Rio can barely picture.

As a police officer once told my wife as she was leaving her house in Rocinha
and stopped to be patted down and inquired why was she being selected:

– Mam, do you know where you are? You are not in in Los Angeles. You are not
in Paris.

My moral qualms went out the window around the same time my grandmother was
murdered by being thrown off a bridge in Aterro do Flamengo.

~~~
drewblaisdell
> Opinions filled with "human rights" concerns from people far removed are
> probably ethically and morally correct, which is... cute. We're fighting an
> Urban War over here.

War is always a good excuse to ignore ethical concerns.

~~~
ufo
I think it is important to point out that this point of view that "human
rights" (with the quotation marks) are something that exists solely to favor
"bad guys", at the expense of "upstanding citizens", is one one of the central
points of alt-right rhetoric in Brazil right now.

------
ufo
I'm surprised that the article didn't mention the recent news story where the
Brazilian army (currently also tasked with policing duty in Rio de Janeiro)
fired 80(!!) rounds at a passing car, murdering a musician and and wounding
his wife and children. A passerby who tried to help also ended up dying a few
days later.

The government was complicit and allowed the case to be tried in a military
court so most likely nothing will come out of it.

------
dade_
A fictional account of the situation. It's a mess and iit isn't going to get
better soon.

Elite Squad: The Enemy Within (2010)
[https://m.imdb.com/title/tt1555149/](https://m.imdb.com/title/tt1555149/)

------
hu3
edit: didn't know people downvoted statistics in HN.

Conversely homicides in Brazil registered the sharpest decline in its history.

[https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/04/22/brazils-murder-rate-
fin...](https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/04/22/brazils-murder-rate-finally-fell-
and-by-a-lot/)

> One of the world’s most homicidal countries just registered the sharpest
> overall decline of lethal violence in its history. Brazil’s murder rate
> dropped by a whopping 13 percent between 2017 and 2018, from more than
> 59,000 people killed to just over 51,000. And homicides fell by 25 percent
> in the first two months of 2019 compared with the same period last year.

~~~
gota
Yes, but this _nothing to do_ with the issue of military police preemptively
sniping people in slums.

The drop in death rates is associated with 'peace treaties' between large
criminal factions in peripheral states such as Rio Grande do Sul and, most
importantly, Ceará. These factions have recently spread across Brazil (last
decade and a half or so) and most recently, concurrently with the economical
crisis of 2014~onwards, have been waging open war.

The article you linked even says:

> The drop in lethal violence started well before the election of the self-
> styled crime-fighter-in-chief, President Jair Bolsonaro, who was elected in
> October 2018.

Rio's governor (who enacted the sniping) was elected along with Bolsonaro.

~~~
hu3
Homicide rate more than halved in a trend that was already bearish. Reduction
went from 13% in Jan 2018 to 25% in Jan 2019. I find this outstanding enough
to be considered a new trend in itself.

------
edpichler
"... Rio de Janeiro police killed 434 citizens."

All of them were innocents? Why do some journalists insist to call criminals
as victims, citizens, and etc?

~~~
saalweachter
For comparison, US police have killed 323 people so far in 2019[1], and the US
is widely regarded as the shootiest, killiest first-world country.

Illinois, which has twice the population of Rio and contains the notorious
crime-ridden hellhole known as Chicago, has had 5 police shootings in 2019.

Assuming a similar trend over the full course of a year (that number is for 3
months), that gives Rio a murder rate _by the police_ of 27.5 per 100k; that
is higher than the murder rate _by criminals_ in Newark, NJ.

In short, that is just an insane number of people being summarily executed on
the street without charges or trial by the police.

[1]
[https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/police...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/police-
shootings-2019/)

------
ramon
Why is the Brazilian police officer wrong when he kills someone and why is any
other officer in any other country right when he does the same? Mistakes
happen it's part of this duty of being the police.

It's a matter of solving the issues it's the most important thing.

I was thinking about the other day since the police is so involved why not
start investigating the police and what they own so you can understand where
there are the bribes.

~~~
coldtea
> _Why is the Brazilian police officer wrong when he kills someone and why is
> any other officer in any other country right when he does the same?_

Who said that? They are wrong in many cases, whether the country.

> _Mistakes happen it 's part of this duty of being the police._

Killing urban poor indiscriminately whenever crime is suspected (or even
widely overusing open fire even when crime is actually committed), are not
mistakes, are policies. Fascist policies.

Brazil is as bad as the Philippines in this regard (and US trigger-happy cops
and SWATing overuse are bad too, yes).

~~~
ramon
This is what I'm saying why is Brazil bad in this regard? How is any other
place better? I think it's just people wanting to talk bad about something
they don't know. Statistics is nothing if you are not living it, statistics
can be hidden too, look at how many donators vs organ transplants in China.

~~~
coldtea
> _This is what I 'm saying why is Brazil bad in this regard? How is any other
> place better?_

In the way that most other places have less butcher cops and less blood-
thirsty supporters of them...

And the more police-civilized places (e.g. most of Nordic and Western Europe,
Japan, New Zealand, etc) have almost zero.

~~~
ramon
The problem is the police or the environment they act upon? Is it lack of
training or it is the behaviour?

