From: Human Rights Watch <hrwatchdc@igc.apc.org>
Newsgroups: soc.culture.brazil
Date: 05 Oct 92 07:30 PDT
Subject: Chacina na Casa de Detencao
Nf-ID: #N:cdp:1598900098:000:6857
Nf-From: cdp.UUCP!hrwatchdc    Oct  5 07:30:00 1992


 Copyright (C) 1992. The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved
 
DS-10-05-92 0938
 
a0538 brazil-prisonriot PM-Brazil-Prison Riot,0571 Relatives,
Human Rights Activists Dispute Police Version of Prison Raid AP
Photos SAO101,SAO2,XSAO1 By STAN LEHMAN Associated Press Writer
   SAO PAULO, Brazil (AP) _ Police tell of 111 inmates slain
mainly by other inmates when a gang fight turned into a riot, but
reports filtering out of Carandiru Prison say police killed at
least 200 prisoners.
   The Rev. William Sheehan, a prison chaplain who spent the
weekend in the prison, said,  "There is no doubt that it was a
massacre.
    "Many were shot dead for no reason at all. Some were killed
by dogs. The number of dead will most likely be higher than the
111 authorities claim." 
   The official version also was called into question by a city 
morgue official who spoke on condition of anonymity. He said 120
bodies were brought from the prison, and many of the dead were
shot through the head and had been bitten by dogs.
   Authorities today released the names of 71 of the dead, and
radio reports said 54 bodies had been claimed by relatives.
   Relatives returning from visits with inmates Sunday recounted
stories of mass killings when police stormed the prison Friday to
put down the uprising. They spoke on condition of anonymity for
fear of retribution against prisoners.
   One woman said police slashed a cross on her grandson's back
with a bayonet and stabbed inmates to death. Another said her
brother, an inmate, described police dogs attacking prisoners,
ripping off ears, noses and genitals.
   An unsigned letter on a napkin, said to have been written by
two inmates and smuggled out by relatives, said police lined
prisoners up against walls or forced them to lie on the floor and
then killed them. The letter said at least 200 prisoners were
slain.
   Police have denied such accusations. "I refuse to accept the
possibility that a massacre was committed because our philosophy
is always to act on the defensive,"  Sao Paulo police chief
Hermes Cruz said.
   According to Sao Paulo state security director Pedro Franco de
Campo, more than 300 riot troops with shotguns, pistols and
machine guns raided the five-story cell block No. 9 in the
prison, Latin America's largest. They quelled the riot in less
than three hours, he said.
   Sheehan, a native of Brockton, Mass., who has worked in Brazil
for 47 years, said,  "All those that died were killed by police." 
  Flavio Augusto Saraiva Straus, of the Sao Paulo Bar
Association's human rights commission, also said police 
"massacred the prisoners." 
    "It's all part of state government's official policy of shoot
first and ask questions later. Police do this on the streets and
in the prisons,"  he said.
   The prison, which holds 7,500 inmates but is built for 4,000,
has long been criticized by human rights groups.
   Cruz, the police chief, said 32 riot troops were wounded, nine
of them shot. He said prisoners were armed with 13 handguns and
pipes and homemade knives.
   One man who visited his nephew in prison said he was told none
of the prisoners had guns.
   Outside the prison, the scene was of despair and anger.
    "He's dead, he's dead. They killed him,"  sobbed Marlene
Pereira, who went to visit her husband, who was imprisoned for
drug trafficking.
    "When I got inside the cellblock, other prisoners told me he 
was dead,"  she said.
    AP-DS-10-05-92 0938EDT
 
 
******************************
 
 Copyright (c) 1992 Reuters Information Services Inc. All rights
reserved.
 
 BC-BRAZIL-PRISON 1STLD
 BRAZIL PRISON UPRISING LEAVES 111 DEAD, 57 WOUNDED (Eds; Updates
with governor's comments, family protests)
    By Katherine Molinski
    SAO PAULO, Oct 3, Reuter - A total of 111 inmates were killed
and 35 wounded at an overcrowded prison known as  "the powder
keg"  when police put down a riot caused by a clash between rival
gangs, a state security spokesman said on Saturday.
    The incident on Friday afternoon at the Detention House jail,
Brazil's largest, was the worst prison violence in the nation's
history, the spokesman said.
    It was not immediately clear how many deaths resulted from
fighting between the gangs and how many from the police action.
    But state security spokesman Valmir Salaro said Sao Paulo
State security chief Pedro Franco de Campos had ordered a
judicial inquiry into police handling of the uprising, which
lasted four hours before being put down by some 600 police
officers.
    No police were killed during the action, but 22 were injured,
he said.
     "We have never seen anything like this in all Brazil's
history,"  Salaro said.
     "The officer in command of the operation has not been
suspended, but an inquiry has been opened into how it was handled
by the police,"  he said.
    Governor Luis Antonio Fleury, who spoke briefly to reporters,
said any judgments about what happened would have to await an
official investigation.
     "I am very sorry about the deaths at the Detention House.
Now, what we have to verify is whether the police action at that
moment was adequate or not,"  Fleury said.
    Detention House was built to hold 3,500 inmates. Its current
population is about 7,350 prisoners, from first-time offenders to
maximum security prisoners.
    Salaro said the violence at the jail began Friday afternoon
when rival gangs in Pavilion 9 attacked each other with homemade
knives, clubs and guns in the pavilion's central patio.
    The conflict quickly spread into a general uprising of the
2,076 prisoners in that pavilion, leading prison officials to
call in military police, elite police teams backed by
helicopters, and firefighters, Salaro said.
    After efforts to negotiate failed, police moved in to take
control of the prison at dusk.
     "It was a direct confrontation (between police and
prisoners). Most of the inmate deaths appear to have resulted
from gunshots,"  Salaro said.
    Police recovered 13 revolvers and dozens of homemade knives
from inside Pavilion 9.
    Family members mounted protests on Saturday outside the
prison in northern Sao Paulo, a sprawling city of nearly 16
million people, demanding more information about the deaths. As
of Saturday night, the names of the dead prisoners had still not
been released to anguished relatives waiting outside.
    Television reports showed police outside the prison using
dogs to keep angry family members at bay. Visitors were not
allowed to meet with surviving Pavilion 9 inmates on Saturday.
    Detention House, dubbed  "the powder keg"  by the Brazilian
press, has a history of violence.
    In March 1982, 14 prisoners died in a similar uprising. In
1985, 3,200 inmates took over the prison for some 20 hours and
nine were killed before the authorities finally got it back under
control.
 REUTER KMM GE
 Reut21:47 10-03