Brazillian police have effected the arrest of more than 200 people on Murder charges in a single day as part of Governments attempts to curb violent murders targeted at women in the country. Government sources said the coordinated sweep against the Murder suspects emphasised the fight against “femicide” or murder of women in Brazil.
The raid was carried out simultaneously all over the country by 6, 600 Police personnel with over 1000 people nabbed in the country-wide crackdown on crime and criminality as reported by Brazil’s public security ministry.
Authorities say the sweep was part of government efforts to respond to ever-rising violent crime in Brazil, which included a sharp increase in femicide, or murders specifically targeting women.
Read: Buddhist Monk Beats Nine Year Old Boy to Death
By the time it was noon, Police personnel had detained 1, 027 adults as well as 75 adolescents according to government sources.
14 of those arrested by the Police were accused of committing femicide while 143 others are accused of the Maria da Penha law related crimes. The law was instituted in 2006 to checkmate domestic violence against women in Brazil and has strengthened penalties against the menace
Other arrested suspects include, 225 people on standard murder charges, 224 on charges of drug dealing and illegal firearms possession while another 421 were detained for other crimes.
Brazil’s Public Security Minister Raul Jungmann said the main focus of the raids was to curb violence against women.
“What matters to us is protecting lives and above all combating femicide, this terrible and unacceptable crime. Some crimes are more serious and repugnant, especially those against women.” He said
A respected annual report released this month by the non-profit Brazilian Forum for Public Security discovered that Brazil’s steady annual rise in homicides has continued unabated.
Brazil now records an average of seven homicides per hour signaling a 2.9 percent increase compared with figures from 2016.
There are now on average more than seven homicides an hour in Latin America’s biggest country, up 2.9 percent on 2016 figures and a six percent increase in murders of women in 2017.
The murders included 1,133 deaths as a result of femicide, or victims being deliberately targeted because they were women.