Brazilian Gangs Wage War On Police · Global Voices
Jose Murilo

Brazilian Gangs Wage War On Police. One of Brazil's biggest gangs, the First Capital Command (of First Command of the Capital — PCC), took the fight to Sao Paulo's government developing a wave of co-ordinated violence since Friday. The heavily armed gang staged 150 attacks on police stations that killed 74 (including at least 40 policemen) and 24 prison uprisings that are currently holding thousands of visitors hostage. Overnight, gangs torched buses, targeted banks and continued their attacks on police patrols and stations. So far, the government has only been able to contain six of the prison uprisings, but that more are occurring as fast as they put them down. The violence — apparently sparked in reaction to the transfer of 765 gang members from their current prisons to higher-security facilities — is an escalation of what many in Sao Paulo are calling a war between the state authorities and the First Command of the Capital (PCC) criminal faction (BBC video).