The Life and Death of Juan Moraes Neves

Source: Diário do Grande ABC. Image: Veja.com.

File under police criminality and violence.

What is unusual about the case is the successful follow-up by forensic investigators: for decades, the rubric “resistance followed by death” has been used to muddy the waters in police shooting cases.

Crime scenes are almost routinely disturbed by supposed “efforts to resuscitate” the victim — a practice recently discontinued by the São Paulo military police, which is resisting the rule requiring the fire brigade to handle paramedical tasks.

Judge Marcio Alexandre Pacheco da Silva of the Fourth Jury Court of Nova Iguaçu, in the Baixada Fluminense, has scheduled for September 9 the trial of four military policemen accused of involvement in the murder of the minor Juan Moraes Neves, 11 years old at the time of his death in June 2011. The incident occurred in Danon, in Nova Iguaçu.

The case was originally recorded as “resistance followed by death” (death of a suspect in armed confrontation with police) but after an investigation by the state judicial police it was concluded that no armed confrontation took place. The judge expects proceedings to last at least four days.

A jury will decided the fate of sergeants Isaías Souza do Carmo and Ubirani Soares and corporals Edilberto Barros do Nascimento and Rubens da Silva. All have been in preventive custody since 2011. At the time of the incident, the four were assigned to the 20th Battalion  (Mesquita).

The PMs were carrying out an antidrug operation in Danon on the the night of June 20, 2011. During that time, two suspects were killed: 11-year-old Juan and Igor de Souza Afonso, 17  (suspected of having ties to the drug trade). Another two young men, including Juan’s brother, were shot, but survived.

Juan’s body was not located until 10 days after the incident along the margins of the Rio Botas in Belford Roxo, a community neighboring Nova Iguaçu.

A state judicial police expert initially stated that the  the body found in the river was that of a young girl. However, a DNA test comparing genetic material from Juan’s family members with a blood sample taken from a sandal worn by the victim on the day he disappeared proved that the body was that of a male.

The Baixada Fluminense homicide division (DHBF) proved that Juan was killed with bullets from two 7.62mm assault rifles used by the PM officers. Ballistics examinations were performed on shell casings found at the scene.

The four PMs were charged with two counts of first-degree murder, two counts of first-degree attempted murder, and tampering with evidence (concealing of a corpse).

«My Dear, You Must Be Joking»

João Luiz Mauad

Instituto Millenium

Translation: C. Brayton

Friday, May 31, was another in a series of terrible days for public safety in Rio de Janeiro. First, we heard reports that various police precincts had decided to “sit on their hands,” refusing to open for business. In placing dilettantism ahead of duty, these people are an example of how vast sectors of civil servants are guided, not by principles, but by the utter lack of them. Any day of the week when police precincts are shuttered — working day, weekend or holiday — is something, not from the third world, but from the fourth, the fifth, the sixth.

On the same day, another foreign tourist was severely injured during a visit to the Rocinha shantytown, in the city’s Southern Zone. The German as shot in the arm, torso and liver. He was taking a walk through the community with a friend when he was surprised by an armed man.

As soon as I read these news, I recalled a shocking article I had read the day before, in the American magazine Slate, in which reputable journalist Anne Applebaum sings  the praises of Brazil and of Rio in particular. The title and subtitle are apologetic: “Brazil’s Special Miracle – Why aren’t Brazilians more willing to promote the secrets of their success?”

In a handful of lines and with painfully shallow knowledge of our country, the author praises Brazil’s incipient entrepreneurship, its failed ethanol program, the welfare state and the Bolsa-Família, the quality of life in the favelas, the leadership of Brazil among the so-called “nonaligned” nations and the positive example Brazil should set for other poor nations.

Frankly, Anne, you must be joking.

Coverage | Rating Port Reports

Via Observatório da Imprensa

By: Rolf Kuntz

Translate: C. Brayton

The Brazilian government is busy trying to stimulate the modernization of and competition among the ports, the stated goals of Provisional Measure 595, approved by a final vote in Congress on May 16.

Brazilian ports are among the best in the world at processing iron ore but occupy 35th place in the handling of containers, according to a study executed by FIRJAN and reproduced in the May 19 edition of O Globo.

To stimulate competition, however, it will be necesary to multiply access routes to various terminals, the Estado de S. Paulo warned in an article published the same day.

The contrast between coverage by the Folha and O Globo is striking: the Folha refers insistently to the current “chaos” as O Globo looks forward to an advance in the rankings, as follows.

Brazilian ports are experiencing a paradox. In port terminals for the export of iron, Brazil leads the world rankings in first, second and fifth place. Among ports that handle containers, it falls to 35th place, bringing up the rear in a study released by FIRJAN, the Rio de Janeiro industrial federation. Investments in increased capacity, modernization of equipment and improvements in electronic cargo handling could elevate Brazil to 17th place within three years. This leap, according to experts, could be favored by the MP dos Portos, approved last week in Congress.

Returning to the Estado analysis and its prognosis of “chaos”:

“The lack of alternative routes ends up overloading the southern and southeastern coastal ports, while other ports are practically idle.  In the area of grains, nearly two-thirds of production for export leaves the country through Santos (SP) and Paranaguá (PR). The rest is divided among 16 terminals scattered along the coast,” the article said.

With these articles, the two newspapers enriched the reader’s understanding one of the hottest and complex issues of the week, the vote on the Provisional Measure of the Ports. The major news organizations made a mighty effort over the course of that week to follow the voting in the two houses of Congress. Moreover, they took the trouble to explain the issue in detail and demonstrate to readers how important it was.

Hard Work

There were long, hard negotiations in the lower house. The government had failed to mobilize its congressional base of support. For this reason, a last-minute push was needed to obtain votes for the measure without agreeing to disastrous amendments.  MP 595 was to lose its validity at midnight on May 16.

An MP is a bill sent down by the executive to be voted by the Congress, with a time constraint. The mechanism is often criticized as an incursion of executive power into the powers of Congress.

With some of its main allies working against the bill, the government had to make concessions and promise resources for projects financed by budget amendments.

According to journalistic accounts, the Treasury is to release R$ 1 billion, and more political appointments are to be made. Debates in Câmara went on well into the night and the decisive session lasted 22 hours. Lawmakers were photographed sleeping on the floor of Congress, but sleep is a luxury reporters do not enjoy.

Observing this marathon was only part of the mission. Day by day it was necessary to explain the principal changes proposed, their consequences, and the probable reaction of the government.  It may be argued whether the effort was consistently successful, but the performance of the media was undeniable. It would be very difficult to obtain, in these conditions, a better result.  On May 17, the major dailies were still fixated on final approval of the bill, obtained quickly and with surprising facility by the Senate. The effort to translate the details of the text for the lay reader and to indicate the likely presidential vetos continued on Saturday.

Complex Agenda

On Sundary, the newspapers made space on the front page again for the topic.  “Brazil may advance in global ranking,” informed O Globo, with a jump head for an article on the classification and future of the ports. “New ports will require new roads and railroads,”, was the top headline of the Estadão. In a more discrete reference to the story, at the foot of the front page, the Folha de S. Paulo registered the statement: “‘I am not an evil genius’, said Eduardo Cunha, an opponent of the MP dos Portos”. Cunha leads the PMDB in the lower house of congress, the part of vice-president Michel Temer and the government’s most powerful ally. Its resistance was the principal obstacle to the approval of the measure.

Given the prospect that certain articles may be vetoed, there is much new material that will have to be explored and explained in subsequent editions. To date, the MP dos Portos is the most complete and best-organized governmental initiative to increase efficiency and competitiveness of the Brazilian economy.  But it is merely one part of a much broader agenda, as exemplified by the Estado’s story on the condition of access roads connecting to the terminals.

Maluf | Corruption Comes Home to Roost

The Maluf-inspired Roberto Marinho Avenue — a Sambodian Big Dig

G1 reports

A court in the Isle of Jersey, a European fiscal paradise, has ordered the transfer of one million pounds sterling — some R$ 4.5 million — with ties to the family of federal deputy Paulo Maluf (PP-SP) to the municipal coffers of São Paulo.

The funds were released on Friday (May 24) and deposited in the account of a law firm representing the city in London.  The money will be returned to the public coffers on May 28, since May 27 is a holiday in Great Britain.

Jersey court denies Maluf appeals Jersey, orders Maluf-owned companies to return US$ 28 million to SP

Jersey condemns Maluf to repay embezzled funds

Decentering São Paulo: The Prefeitura’s Master Plan

São Paulo’s new mayor has a plan for the Augean Stables of one of the world’s most automobilistic sprawls.

Source: Brasilianas.Org.

By: Wanderley Preite Sobrinho
Translation: C. Brayton

SÃO PAULO — With its Arch of the Future and “urban corridor” plans, the city government intends to revise the Strategic Master Plan by increasing the supply of jobs on the periphery of the city without having to restrict the circulation of automobiles.

The administration of São Paulo mayor Haddad is betting all of its chips on revising the city’s Strategic Master Plan in order to reduce traffic congestion without the need to restrict traffic in the central districts, as it has since 1997 with the rodizio, the  once-a-week rotating restriction of automobiles based on license-plate numbers.

In this way, the city will also have no need to challenge the federal government’s industrial incentives program, responsible for an increase in the purchase of personal automobiles — the principal villain of traffic congestion in the city.

The city government’s strategy is to use the Master Plan to realize one of the principal promises of mayoral candidate Fernando Haddad (PT): the Arc of the Future, whose aim is to reduce the circulation of vehicles in the expanded urban center by urbanizing and attracting jobs to the periphery, where most of the city’s population lives.

Rio | The Return of the New Van Plan

Black-market van stuffed with 10 armed, ninja-style black-clad corpses, December 2007, Rio de Janeiro

Source: O Globo — Portal ClippingMP.
Translation: C. Brayton

A follow-up to Rio Has New Man With Plan for Van, from 2007.

That year, fierce feuds over turf and market share broke out among the militias and drug traffickers who shake down independent operators of vans and mototaxis for «tolls» and «insurance».

It makes you wonder: are such measures also aimed at undermining the economic base of the milícia — cohorts of current and ex-police who invade territory neglected by the state and impose a mafia-style discipline — in these areas.

Probably. Ferraz, the special secretary of supplementary public transportation, made his bones pursuing the militias of Rio. He is also the author of the novel that formed the basis of the film Tropa de Elite |  Elite Squad 2.  The official announcement, from December 2007:

On December 5. Rio de Janeiro mayor Eduardo Paes announced the creation of a special office of supplementary public transportation, led by state judicial police official Cláudio Ferraz, former commander of the anti-organized crime bureau that has pursued the militias of Rio.

The Ban on the Van

Truth Commission SP | Who the Hell Was Halliwell?

I read it in the Estadão.

Ongoing work by federal and state truth commissions related to the military dictatorship of 1964-1985 has turned up the log entries of persons entering and exiting the notorious torture facilities of São Paulo — among them a U.S. diplomat who was a frequent visitor.

U.S. citizen  Claris Halliwell, identified as a regular visitor to S. Paulo’s Department of Social and Political Order — DOPS — during the military dictatorship, was a diplomat working out of the São Paulo consulate as a political attaché.

According to a telegram dispatched in 1973 by the U.S. Embassy to the Department of State, he began to receive threats because of his activities.

The name Halliwell came to light after  a series of  log books or sign-in registers were found in the archives of the defunct department — one of the most significant centers of political repression in Brazil during the 1970s.

A state-sponsored study of these records showed Halliwell spending time at the DOPS building between April 1971 and November 1973. Identifying himself as a “consul,” in 1971 he visited the site twice a month, on average, meeting directly with frontline agents of the political repression, many of them accused of torturing political prisoners.

Contacted for comment by the Estado, representatives of the Consulate São Paulo said they could not confirm Halliwell’s stay in São Paulo because they did not keep records from that far back in time. They might be found, however, in the U.S. National Archive.

But it will not be easy. A preliminary search turns up only a declassified exchange of messages between Brazil and State, detailing the threatening calls targeting Halliwell.

THERE IS A POSSIBILITY THAT THIS INCIDENT MAY BE LINKED TO THE FIRE BOMBING INCIDENT AT THE HOME OF CONSUL JAMES W. LAWLER ON MAY 18, 1973, OR TO A SERIES OF HARRASSMENT CALLS RECEIVED IN JUNE

Still, there are a substantial number of results from the 1970s on the keyword “DEOPS.” Download for later reading.

Vi O Mundo provides more detail — although I think is no correct to call Halliwell a «consul». He was one of those attaché sorts of people. 

UPP All Night | Measuring Rio’s Pacification Policy

Attacks by drug traffickers show that urban pacification remains a challenge …

By: Antônio Werneck
Source: O Globo |  23/02/2013 | Portal ClippingMP.
Translation & subtitles: C. Brayton

«… an investigation underway indicating that an internal struggle over the management of the escola de samba Mangueira has resulted in homicides.»

The carioca daily measures the progress of the UPP program — Police Pacification Units, more or less. Implemented in 2008, the program is modeled on a similar policy initiative in Medellín, Colombia.

The basic idea is to create a permanent police presence by establishing bases inside the communities served, while carefully overseeing base personnel for signs of corruption or participation in social-entrepreneurial, parapolitical militia schemes.

UPP coordinator admis that intelligence services need improvement.

Bicho + Globo + LIESA = RICO?

Source: O Globo.

RIO — Sunday, as the spotlights fell on the Special Group at the Sambadrome, an operation by state judicial police internal affairs launched 9 days ago found irregularities inside LIESA, the  League of Independent Escolas de Samba.

Entering the office of LIESA president  Jorge Castanheira, police served search and seizure warrants for evidence reflecting the participation of military police officers — among them, majors and colonels — in the provision of internal security for the festivities, contrary to a ruling by the state secretary of public safety.

Among the documents seized during Operation Finger of God II was a spreadsheet listing 37 names of security personnel hired to control access to the passarela in 2012.

At the time, state secretary Beltrame had already issued an order forbidding the involvement of police personnel in this capacity. In defiance of this rule, six colonels, five majors and a captain are listed in the document as security personnel in the employ of  MJC Eventos. The company has a services contract with Liesa and includes reserve colonel Celso Pereira de Oliveira among its partners.

O GLOBO was provided with exclusive access to some of the materials collected from Castanheira’s office. Seized at the location were two laptops, a CPU, a pen drive and a number of documents.

Give My Regards to the Big Turk

The discovery of police personnel moonlighting as Sambadrome security was not the only problem uncovered by the operation.

Among the papers seized was a handwritten letter of two pages, signed by a certain João Luis, which suggests that  the LIESA president is not exclusively busy with organizing the Carnaval parade.

The author says he is involved in a dispute with bicho banker José Caruzzo Escafura, aka Piruinha, and asks Castanheira to intercede on his behalf with bicho banker Antônio Petrus Kalil, aka The Big Turk.

Piurinha and the Rio Police

Piruinha I have heard of only in passing. The federal police union published the following anecdote.

The federal police investigations that resulted in Operation Black Op show that Haylton Carlos Escafura — the son of  José Caruzzo Escafura, a top Rio bicho banker  — relied on the protection of 10 state judicial police patrol cars during a transfer of automobiles belonging to the agency Euro Imported Cars, in Barra de Tijuca, in which he is a partner.

The security scheme was placed at the disposal of the racketeer by a ranking judicial police officer on November 24, 2010, on the eve of the invasion of the Complexo do Alemão. Wiretaps show that  Haylton was afraid that his auto agency would be targeted by rivals in the “nickel-hunter” gambling machine racket.

The intimate ties between Piruinha and state police may explain the fact that Haylton remains at large. He was one of 22 persons ordred arrested by a Federal court in October, when the federals kicked off Black Ops.

GLOBO has had access to excerpts of the wiretaps in which Piruinha’s son discusses the transfer of vehicles with Fábio Dutra Souza, his partner in the business, located on the Avenida Ministro Ivan Lins.

We, The Wise Guys

Returning to the most recent report by O Globo, and the letter leaked to it.

The author of the letter, dated 29 de setembro de 2011, begins by apologizing for pestering the LIESA president, then suggests that  Castanheira is fully aware of the rules imposed by the senior leadership of the bicho rackets of Rio.  “You and the other racketeers, with the exception of José Escafura, who for years now has not respected or enforced the rules of the mafia to which he belongs …”

Bills Were Paid by Bicho Bankers?

This was not the only connection to the bicho racket uncovered by police. During the same operation, police internal affairs, which visited another 13 addresses, discovered seven electricity bills in the name of Castanheira at a bicho operations center belonging to «Captain Guimarães». The discovery suggests that the LIESA president had his bills paid by the Captain.

Sought for comment by GLOBO, Jorge Castanheira denied any involvement with the bicho rackets and said he knows nothing about the letter discovered by police. He also denies that his electricity bills were paid for by “Captain” Guimarães.

— This proceeding is confidential. I have not had access to its content, but the press has. I cannot understand it. I have no ties to the bicho bankers. Today, I am president of LIESA, but for the last 28 years I have worked [as a general assistant]. During those years, I received a degree in economics. I receive hundreds of letters as president of LIESA, but none of them have anything to do with the bicho racket. I have nothing to do with any criminal conspiracy and I don’t know whose electricity bills these are.

Castanheira added that the only electricity bills on which his name appears are related to the offices occupied by LIESA from 1987 to 1995. Regarding the hiring of police to provide security, he said he had asked MJC to give preferential treatment to reserve officers.

Rule Applies to Police Reserves as Well

Despite what Castanheira says, reserve officers of the military police are not exempt from the disciplinary provisions of Decree 6579/83 …  According to this rule, military police must respect the police hierarchy both as current and off-duty or reserve police agents. Thus, Beltrame’s decree applies to retired PMs as well.

The public safety secretary said that it is looking into the irregular provision of services by its personnel during Carnaval. In a note, the department said that since 2008, more than 1,393 state judicial and military police have been expelled by the three internal affairs departments … for various misdeeds.

Finger of God II grew out of an analysis of data obtained during Finger of God I in December 2011. During the second phase, starting on 31 January 2012, the police applied for arrest warrants for bicho bankers Capitão Guimarães and Luiz Pacheco Drumond, aka Luizinho Drumond, both of them former  Liesa presidents.

Their warrant applications were not granted, however.

LIESA, The Untouchable Monopoly

Why not? This is the question that demands an answer when it comes to understanding how for nearly 18 years LIESA has dominated Carnaval in Rio from start to finish, from lighting to ticket sales, from the sound system to every other aspect of the festivities.

Including broadcast rights, which LIESA has ceded to the Globo network despite the best efforts of the state legislature to put an end to its rein.

Bicho + Globo + LIESA = RICO?

I posted a note on that general topic in 2007.

• Rio: “Why Does Globo Monopolize Carnival?”

Historically linked to the bicho numbers racket, LIESA has monopolized the organized Carnaval celebration since 1995. Year in and year out, promises of a competitive public auction have failed to pan out.

Rio mayor Eduardo Paes scheduled such an auction on various occasions and succeeded in conducting one for 2010, but the proposal as passed failed to meet certain requirements of the TCM, the city accounting tribunal.

This year, as I noted recently, TCM justices lost their free access to a Sambadrome sky box on the grounds that the justices should not be benefiting from a contract on which they will eventually have to pronounce judgment.

Unlike what the bicho bankers claimed, the terms as stated were not valid; the auction would have to be redone, but there was not enough time left. Thus did Carnaval 2011 fall back into the hands of LIESA.

Last year, alleging lack of competition in the auction for Carnaval 2009, a Rio court froze the assets of former mayor  Cesar Maia, who hired LIESA R$ 5.3 million.

And therein lies another tale.

Brazilian Curriculum Wars | Testing Wordfast

• Translating a PPT with Wordfast Anywhere

An excellent new tool — well, not so new, as many friends have sung its praises, the Wordfast online translation and translation memory is one my list of things to tinker with. Maybe it is time to abandon OmegaT.

The main drawback is that all local versions work only with MS Word running on WINE. They say this works well, but why pay for Word when there is Open Office, capable of handling a brigade of document formats.

As an example translation, PT>EN-US and using Wordfast Anywhere, follows.

CNV due to investigate textbooks at military schools

By Lair Amaro

Historical omissions mark books used in military schools.

Textbooks used to teach Brazilian history in military schools omit information essential to the understanding of certain episodes of the military dictatorship (1964-1985).

Narrating the 1964 «revolution», for example, one volume of the Trompowsky Marshal collection argues that the coup was planned, promoted and carried out by moderate, law-abiding groups.

The book goes on to say that the Congress declared the Presidency vacant before choosing general Castello Branco as president, not long after the coup. It omits the fact that the deposed president had not fled the jurisdiction and was still in Brazil.

Another book, «500 years of History of Brazil», says that the Guerrilla of the Araguaia (1972-1975) was defeated “when its leaders fled,” ignoring the executions and disappearance captured by the Army.

Brazil has 12 military academies. Each offers 6 years of elementary schooling of basic education and 3 years middle school education and have 14,000 students, many of them children of military personnel.

The coordinator of the National Truth Commission, Claude Fonteles, affirmed that these textbooks could be targeted for recommendations by the commission, which was instituted to investigation human rights abuses during the dictatorship.

“This is a proper subject for inclusion in our recommendations,” Fonteles said. It is necessary to respect the autonomy of the military schools, but schools cannot simply ignore the curricula adopted by other schools, both public and private schools.

UFRJ history professor Carlos Fico says the government should promote a general inspection and reform of military school curricula. “We know nothing about how the the schools for officers are run, says Fico. It is not a military issue. It directly affects public safety.
The National Association of History intends to ask the Ministries of Education and Defense to evaluate textbooks adopted in the military schools.

Editorial Reply

In a note, the Ministry of the Education said that it cannot interfere with the curriculum of military schools. For its part, the Ministry of the Defense informed that it only monitors the curriculum of institutions dedicated to training officers and enlisted men.

Gen. Jose Carlos Dos Santos — curator of the Marshal Trompowsky collection and commander of the Army’ DEPA training program — had no comment and suggested that further questions be addressed to the press relations office of the Army.

In a note of its own, the Army informed that it had cost three years of research to produce the standard curriculum and that its textbooks are reviewed annually, but declined to answer more specific questions.

A common point of disgreement in the history textbooks is the presentation of the categories «ideal socialism» and «actual socialism» — Stalin, Lenin and the like –in contrast with “ideal capitalism” and “actual capitalism». The theory is vintage Weber.

My high school Advanced Placement exams in history, I recall, used a similar approach — colleges are not interested in candidates who fear midnight kidnappings by North Korean brainwashing squads.