12 alleged criminals die in a police operation in Rio de Janeiro

A police operation against the so-called militiamen, former members of the security forces turned criminals, ended at dawn this Friday in a bloodbath in Rio de Janeiro.

A dozen militiamen traveling in a convoy have died in a shootout with civilian police officers in Baixada Fluminense, on the outskirts of Rio.

The group had been under surveillance for 15 days within the operation to guarantee security in the municipal elections scheduled for November 15 after two candidates were recently assassinated in that area.

This is the most forceful (and lethal) operation in recent times against the militias.

These are peculiar groups within the criminal ecosystem of Rio de Janeiro, where life-long underworld groups coexist with drug traffickers who nest in the favelas and these gangs made up of men who were formerly police, military or firefighters and are they turned to organized crime.

The main criminal activity of the militiamen is usually extortion in the neighborhoods in which they have become strong.

The family clan led by the Brazilian president, Jair Bolsonaro, has been persecuted for years by suspicions of links with these criminal groups.

His eldest son, Senator Flavio Bolsonaro, employed in his cabinet the mother and wife of Adriano Nóbrega, a powerful militiaman who a few months ago died in a police operation in which many saw an attempt to eliminate evidence, which in Brazil they call file burning.

The ultra-rightist built his long career as a deputy from Rio de Janeiro and focused on defending the corporate interests of the troops of the Armed Forces and the police.

The police tried to intercept the group on several occasions without success until last night they managed to corner them in a municipality called Itaguaí, according to commissioner Rodrigo Oliveira and published by the newspaper

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This has assured that the first shot came from the criminals, who wounded one of their agents.

There the shooting began, which has ended with the death of the 12 militiamen who were traveling in four vehicles, including one that was taken to the hospital.

Various weapons were seized from the group: five rifles, three machine guns, pistols, a grenade, and radios to communicate.

The body in charge of carrying out the operation against the militias is the civilian police, which traditionally in Brazil is dedicated to investigations and is not deployed in the streets, territory of the military police.