Page 12 - ARUBA TODAY

A12 WORLD NEWS
Friday 23 august 2019

Killings by police divide Brazilian city weary of crime

By MARCELO SILVA DE SOU- far-right group that advo-
SA cates a stronger military
Associated Press role in Brazilian life.
RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) — “It’s impossible to end crimi-
It happens, on average, nality without fatal victims,”
more than five times a day she said.
in Rio de Janeiro: Police “There is no confrontation
open fire and someone in history in which everyone
dies. comes out unscathed.”
Brazilian human rights and But the rise in violence in-
victims’ groups are rais- volving police led Renata
ing alarms about the re- Souza, head of the Human
cord levels of deaths at Rights Commission for Rio
police hands in the state state, to present a com-
of 17.2 million people, with plaint against the governor
1,075 slain in the first seven to the U.N. special investi-
months of the year, ac- gator on extrajudicial kill-
cording to official figures. ings in May.
And far-right Rio state Gov. “The governor himself ac-
Wilson Witzel and President knowledges that he is not
Jair Bolsonaro are pushing going to respect human
to give police a still-freer rights and is going to deal
hand. with violence with more vi-
Witzel said in July that po- olence,” Souza said.
lice should lose their “fear Witzel’s policies include
of killing.” Bolsonaro said In this May 31, 2019 photo, cinderblock homes blanket a hill in the Vidigal slum in Rio de Janeiro, frequent flights over slums
this month that with a new Brazil. with helicopters manned
law he backs, criminals Associated Press by police snipers and few
“are going to die in the according to the non-gov- “the police have recov- Rozário Junior said. “I can’t places have echoed with
street like cockroaches.” ernment violence monitor ered their respect.” be quiet because if so, the sound of the choppers
That echoes the radical an- Crossfire. The number of police kill- Kauã would be just one as much as Mare, a slum
ti-crime stance that helped The 194 such deaths re- ings has reached the high- more statistic.” complex in the city’s north.
Bolsonaro win the presi- ported by officials for July est levels since records be- Citizens groups have sprung There, musician David Vi-
dency last year — ending was the most killings involv- gan being kept in 2003. up in the slums to combat cente said he is part of a
a four-election string of left- ing police in a single month According to Crossfire, a police violence. different way to reduce
ist victories — and many since at least 1998. It’s not growing number of people “We aren’t warriors here, crime.
Brazilians see the police- clear how many were in- are hit, often killed, each we are survivors. We have He’s part of a favela or-
caused deaths as a regret- volved in firefights with po- year by stray bullets — some to speak, denounce, com- chestra meant to give
table but acceptable price lice, how many were un- fired by criminals, some by plain about what is hap- youths an alternative to the
for cracking down on ram- armed suspects and how police. It said there were pening,” said Bárbara Nas- gangs.
pant crime. many were bystanders hit 225 deaths by stray bullets cimento, a coordinator of “My part today is to save
“Unfortunately, the police by stray shots. last year and more than the group Stop Killing Us, children, just as I was saved
today need to be very Meanwhile, official reports 100 so far this year. which emerged in the Vidi- by the orchestra,” he said.
hard,” said Isaque Samora, show a 23% drop in homi- “The governor’s men are gal favela. “I was a boy with a lot of
an Uber driver who lives in cides, a 22% fall in auto going out to shoot at in- The group cites as an ex- free time, wandering in the
Duque de Caxias, a munic- thefts and a 9% jump in nocent people,” said Joc- ample a February police street, and today half my
ipality in the state with high drug seizures. ely do Rozário Junior, who operation in the Fallet friends are tied up in traf-
rates of crime. Brazil as a whole saw 65,602 blames the May 16 death Fogueteiro slum in which 15 ficking,” said the 20-year-
He said he drives only homicides in 2017, while of his 11-year-old son on suspected gang members old.
during the day, to lessen preliminary calculations for police gunfire. were killed. “We should show children
chances of falling victim to 2018 showed more than He said the boy, Kauã Ro- Neighbors and relatives say that they have another
criminals. 51,500 killings last year, ac- zario, who spoke of one the suspects were tortured path than the obvious one,
Even so, two months ago, cording to the indepen- day becoming a preach- and killed. which is drug traffic.”
he drove a passenger into dent Brazilian Forum on er, was riding his bicycle in The mother of one of those Vicente said most of his
a Rio slum and only a few Public Security. the Rio de Janeiro slum of killed, speaking on condi- neighbors are less fearful
yards (meters) into the Battles between criminal Vila Alianca when he hap- tion of anonymity for fear of the police than of be-
shantytown he was inter- gangs have become com- pened across a police pur- of reprisals, told The Asso- ing caught in crossfire or hit
cepted by robbers armed mon. suit of drug suspects and ciated Press her son was by shots from a helicopter.
with pistols and rifles. “People are fed up with the was hit by a stray bullet. cut across the throat and “You’re not safe even in-
“Security would only im- advance of criminality,” Five days later, he died. stabbed in his belly with a side your house because a
prove quickly if all citizens said Ricardo Ismael, a po- Police haven’t acknowl- knife by police. shot can enter through the
were policeman,” added litical scientist at the Pon- edged shooting the boy, Bolsonaro and Witzel want roof,” he said.
Samora, who said he voted tifical Catholic University in saying the case is under in- to give police an ever freer He said that instead of
for Bolsonaro because of Rio de Janeiro. vestigation. hand. They back a bill in shooting more, officials
his promise to be inflexible “The harshest repressive But Rozário Junior said wit- Congress that would for- should focus on programs
with criminals. measures meet the wishes nesses told him the boy was give actions by police who that give options to be-
So far, crime is down amid of a population that can’t hit by police gunfire. can show they were moti- coming a gang member,
the rising quantity of blood stand living with such high “My son wasn’t an adult or vated by fear, surprise or based on education and
shed by official forces. indices of criminality.” a trafficker. He wasn’t any- “violent emotion.” culture.
Police-involved shootings in In a sort of state-of-the-city thing like that, but he lived The hard line doesn’t both- “I’m probably not a traf-
Rio have jumped 25%, with speech after six months in with fear every time he saw er people such as Sonia ficker today because I had
1,144 in the first six months, office, Witzel boasted that the police,” Manzano, a member of a access to that.”q