São Paulo shootings: 18 killed in city's deadliest massacre this year

In the sixth and deadliest massacre this year in São Paulo, 18 people were shot dead in two neighbouring suburbs on Thursday night. According to local authorities, the attacks began around 8.30pm, when masked gunmen shot 10 of the victims in a bar in the district of Osasco. The shootings continued over a period of around three hours. A total of 15 people were killed in eight attacks in Osasco; three died in two incidents in Barueri.

One witness, speaking anonymously to the newspaper O Estado do São Paulo, described the killing of 16-year old Rodrigo Lima da Silva. A car pulled up on the pavement outside the sandwich bar where he was sitting, the witness said, and a hooded man got out. “He looked him up and down, with his hand hidden in his waist. Then he just pulled out his gun and shot him.” Lima was shot in the eye and the mouth.

In a press conference on Friday afternoon, Alexandre de Moraes, the head of the São Paulo state public safety department, said the killings were carried out by a group of at least six men. Another murder on the same night in the nearby district of Itapevi was deemed to be unrelated.

From witness testimony and security camera footage, police identified two cars, a silver Peugeot and a silver Sandero, as well as a black motorcycle that were used by the gunmen. In local media interviews, the mayor of Osasco, Jorge Lapas, said the killings may have been carried out in reprisal for the recent killings of two police officers.

According to Moraes, as yet there is no main line of investigation. “The involvement of police officers in the case is one of the theories under consideration,” he said. A task force of 50 police officers has been set up to investigate the attacks.

In at least two of the shootings, witnesses said the gunmen had asked their victims to state their names and whether they had a criminal record. Moraes said this was “typical of those who pretend to be police officers”. He added that there was no apparent link between the victims. Six had criminal records.

Five other massacres have taken place this year in São Paulo. In April, eight members of Pavilhão Nove, a group of supporters of the Corinthians football team, were shot dead in their clubhouse while preparing banners for a match. One serving and one former police officer were arrested over the killings.

Off-duty police officers have been accused of involvement in recent massacres in the Amazonian cities of Manauas and BelÉm.

Brazil has one of the highest murder rates in the world, with more than 53,000 violent deaths in 2013, according to the Brazilian Forum on Public Safety. Between 2009 and 2013, Brazilian police killed 11,197 people – more than the total number of people killed by police in the US over the past 30 years. During the same five-year period, 1,170 police officers were killed.