In a letter to the Associated Press, the civil police press office acknowledged the murder of the policeman and 24 accused “criminals.”
According to footage broadcast on local media, a police helicopter swooped low over the Jacarezinho slum while heavily armed men escaped authorities by leaping from roof to roof.
One woman told The Associated Press that she witnessed police shooting and killing a seriously injured man who she described as defenceless and unarmed after he escaped from inside her home.
According to a statement from the firm that manages the metro line, service was momentarily halted “due to intensive firing in the region.” Two metro passengers were hurt earlier when the window of one car was smashed by a stray gunshot.
The Comando Vermelho, one of Brazil‘s most powerful criminal groups, rules Jacarezinho, one of the city’s most populated favelas, with 40,000 people. According to the authorities, Jacarezinho is one of the group’s headquarters.
According to authorities, the operation on Thursday was intended to examine the recruiting of youths to hijack trains and commit other crimes.
On Thursday afternoon, a group of around 50 locals in Jacarezinho crammed into a tiny street to watch representatives of the state legislature’s human rights commission perform an examination. They chanted “justice” and lifted their right fists in the air, clapping their hands.
According to the police statement, the criminal gang has a “warlike organisation of troops armed with weapons, grenades, bulletproof vests, handguns, disguised clothes, and other military accoutrements,” according to the police statement.
According to the Public Safety Observatory at Candido Mendes University, at least 12 police operations in Rio state have resulted in three or more deaths this year. The raid on Thursday, according to Observatory director Silvio Ramos, was one of the worst in the city’s recent history.
Many of them appear to be in violation of a judgement by Brazil’s Supreme Court last year ordering police activities to be suspended during the epidemic and limited to “very extraordinary” circumstances.
When asked by The Associated Press if Thursday’s operation would qualify, the Supreme Court declined to comment.
According to the Observatory, Rio police murdered an average of more than five individuals per day in the first quarter of 2021, the most fatal start to a year since the state government began regularly publishing such statistics more than two decades ago.
