Brazilian Gang Kills Dozens Of Police

A notorious criminal gang 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 Sunday that killed at least 35 police officers, the girlfriend of one of them, two passers-by and 14 suspected gang members.

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

Late Sunday evening, the Folha de Sao Paulo newspaper's Web site reported the death toll had risen to 55 and that at least 10 public buses had been burned by bandits in the city of Sao Paulo.

TV images showed the buses engulfed in flames, while Folha Online said passengers were ordered out of the vehicles before bandits set them ablaze.

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 organized 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 PCC was founded in 1993 by hardened criminals at the Taubate Penitentiary in Sao Paulo but remained a relatively obscure group until February 2001, when it organized the biggest prison uprising in Brazil's history.

The gang is involved in drug and arms trafficking, kidnappings, bank robberies and extortion, police say.

The latest attacks and ensuing gun battles have 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 bulletproof 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 homemade bombs in the attacks in Sao Paulo city and its suburbs; coastal cities like Santos, Guaruja and Cubatao; and cities more than 185 miles away.

On Sunday 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 newsstand employee. "After what I read in the newspaper, I don't think it's very safe to be near a policeman."

Witnesses to the killing of police officer Jose Antonio Martinez told the Folha Online 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 caliber 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.

During a 10-day period in November 2003, the PCC attacked more than 50 police stations with machine guns, homemade bombs, shotguns and pistols. Three officers and two suspected gang members were killed and 12 people injured in the apparent attempt to pressure authorities to improve prison conditions.

The 2001 prison uprising organized by the PCC resulted in the deaths of 19 inmates as the rebellion spread to dozens of penitentiaries and jails across Sao Paulo state.

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

By Stan Lehman