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The bodies of people killed the day before during a police raid targeting the Comando Vermelho gang lie in the Complexo da Penha favela of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo\/Silvia Izquierdo)<\/p>\n
The bodies of people killed the day before during a police raid targeting the Comando Vermelho gang lie in the Complexo da Penha favela of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo\/Silvia Izquierdo)<\/p>\n
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Police and soldiers had launched the raid in helicopters, armored vehicles and on foot, targeting the Red Command gang. They drew gunfire and other retaliation from gang members, sparking scenes of chaos across the city on Tuesday. Schools in the affected areas shuttered, a local university canceled classes, and roads were blocked with buses used as barricades. <\/p>\n
Many shops remained closed Wednesday morning in Penha, where local activist Raull Santiago said he was part of a team that found about 15 bodies before dawn.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe saw executed people: shot in the back, shots to the head, stab wounds, people tied up. This level of brutality, the hatred that is spread – there\u2019s no other way to describe it except as a massacre,\u201d Santiago said.<\/p>\n
Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered Castro to provide information about the police operation and scheduled a hearing with the state governor and the heads of the military and civil police next Monday in Rio.<\/p>\n
The Senate\u2019s commission for human rights said it was asking for clarifications from the Rio state government. Meanwhile, Rio prosecutors requested that Castro provide detailed information about the operation and proof that there was no less harmful means of achieving its objectives. <\/p>\n
And the federal public prosecutor\u2019s office asked the Forensic Medical Institute to ensure that autopsy reports contain full descriptions and photographic and radiographic documentation of all injuries.<\/p>\n
Castro said on Tuesday that Rio was at war against \u201cnarco-terrorism,\u201d a term that echoed the Trump administration in its campaign against drug smuggling<\/a> in Latin America. <\/p>\n On Wednesday, Castro called the operation a \u201csuccess,\u201d apart from the deaths of the four police officers. <\/p>\n Rio\u2019s state government said that the suspects who had been killed had resisted police.<\/p>\n Rio has been the scene of lethal police raids for decades. In March 2005, some 29 people were killed in Rio\u2019s Baixada Fluminense region, while in May 2021, 28 were killed in the Jacarezinho favela.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Residents surround the bodies of people killed the day before during a police raid targeting the Comando Vermelho gang in the Complexo da Penha favela of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo\/Silvia Izquierdo)<\/p>\n Residents surround the bodies of people killed the day before during a police raid targeting the Comando Vermelho gang in the Complexo da Penha favela of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo\/Silvia Izquierdo)<\/p>\n Read More<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Relatives mourn over the bodies of people killed the day before during a police raid targeting the Comando Vermelho gang in the Complexo da Penha favela of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo\/Silvia Izquierdo)<\/p>\n Relatives mourn over the bodies of people killed the day before during a police raid targeting the Comando Vermelho gang in the Complexo da Penha favela of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo\/Silvia Izquierdo)<\/p>\n Read More<\/p>\n But the scale and lethality of Tuesday\u2019s operation are unprecedented. Non-governmental organizations and the U.N. human rights body quickly raised concerns over the high number of reported fatalities and called for investigations.<\/p>\n \u201cWe fully understand the challenges of having to deal with violent and well-organized groups such as Red Command,\u201d said U.N. Human Rights Spokesperson Marta Hurtado said. <\/p>\n But Brazil must \u201cbreak this cycle of extreme brutality and ensure that law enforcement operations comply with international standards regarding the use of force,\u201d she said, adding that the body was calling for full-fledged policing reform.<\/p>\n Late on Wednesday, President Luiz In\u00e1cio Lula da Silva<\/a> said on X that he had instructed the justice minister and director-general of Federal Police to meet Castro for a meeting in Rio. <\/p>\n Brazil cannot accept that organized crime \u201ccontinues to destroy families, oppress residents, and spread drugs and violence across cities,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n The operation\u2019s stated objectives were capturing leaders and limiting the territorial expansion of the Red Command gang, which has increased its control over favelas in recent years.<\/p>\n Gang members allegedly targeted police with at least one drone. Rio de Janeiro\u2019s state government shared a video on X of what appeared to show a drone firing a projectile from the sky.<\/p>\n Gov. Castro, from the conservative opposition Liberal Party, said Tuesday that Rio was \u201calone in this war.\u201d He said the federal government should be providing more support to combat crime \u2014 in a swipe at the administration of Lula\u2019s leftist administration.<\/p>\n His comments were challenged by the Justice Ministry, which said it had responded to requests from Rio\u2019s state government to deploy national forces in the state, renewing their presence 11 times.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A woman mourns over the bodies of people killed the day before during a police raid targeting the Comando Vermelho gang in the Complexo da Penha favela of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo\/Silvia Izquierdo)<\/p>\n A woman mourns over the bodies of people killed the day before during a police raid targeting the Comando Vermelho gang in the Complexo da Penha favela of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Wednesday, Oct. 29, 2025. (AP Photo\/Silvia Izquierdo)<\/p>\n Read More<\/p>\n Gleisi Hoffmann, the Lula administration\u2019s liaison with the parliament, agreed that more coordinated action was needed but pointed to a recent crackdown on money laundering<\/a> as an example of the federal government\u2019s action on organized crime.<\/p>\n Justice Minister Ricardo Lewandowski said it was clearly an extremely bloody and violent operation.<\/p>\n \u201cWe should reflect on whether this kind of action is compatible with the Democratic Rule of Law that governs us all,\u201d he told journalists on Wednesday.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
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