The São Paulo State Police Ombudsman’s Office, together with human rights and parliamentary entities, expressed disgust and indignation at the death of a 4-year-old boy and a 17-year-old boy, during a Military Police operation, on Tuesday night Friday (5), at Morro São Bento, in Santos.
Four-year-old Ryan da Silva Andrade Santos was playing with other children on the sidewalk in front of his cousin’s house, when he was hit by a gunshot, which according to PM spokesperson highlighted, in a note, “everything indicates, due to the dynamics of the incident, the way the scenario was arranged there, that this shot came from the gun of a military police officer.”
In addition to Ryan, the police shot two other minors. Gregory Ribeiro Vasconcelos, 17 years old, died at the scene and the other, 15 years old, was rescued, underwent surgery and is not at risk of death.
“It is unacceptable that the management of the Public Security Secretariat of the State of São Paulo, as well as the command of PMESP [Polícia Militar]consider death, especially of children, as an acceptable result of the actions of police forces. This has been the increasingly common result of PMESP’s violent and excessive actions in poor neighborhoods and on the outskirts of the state”, says the note from human rights defense entities.
In addition to the Ombudsman’s Office, the Amparar Association, Feminist Bench, Center for Human Rights and Popular Education, Arns Commission, Conectas Human Rights, Ediane Maria – state deputy, Eduardo Suplicy – State deputy, Brazilian Public Security Forum, Sou da Institute signed the note. Peace, Vladimir Herzog Institute, Mothers of May Independent Movement, Network for Protection and Resistance against Genocide.
The note emphasizes that, in the current administration, actions indicative of summary executions are being carried out by police agents, with no brakes or effective control for repeated abuses of fundamental rights, in addition to a military police that feels legitimized to act with brutality and verbalizing revenge, neglecting professionalism.
The entities remember previous cases, such as a 7-year-old child injured in the eye, in April this year, in Paraisópolis, who lost his vision after being shot during a PM operation while going to school. In March, Edneia Fernandes Silva, mother of six children, was killed by a gunshot to the head in a square in Santos, during an intervention by the PM in the so-called Operation Summer.
“It is evident that Ryan’s tragic death is not an isolated incident, but rather the consequence of a way of acting guided by conflict and the use of excessive force, which promotes deaths and the violation of fundamental rights, especially on the outskirts of the state”, they reiterate the entities.
Ryan’s father
The organizations that signed the repudiation note also reported that the boy Ryan’s father, Leonel Andrade dos Santos, was killed by the Military Police earlier this year, during the second phase of Operation Escudo/Verão, with the argument that he was accused of other crimes and that he had drawn a firearm.
“Family members and neighbors interviewed by members of the organizations that signed the note state that there was not even an approach and that Leonel was physically disabled. He and a neighbor were executed by the police. The death of people in police operations, in addition to generating immeasurable impacts on families, undermines the trust of affected communities in the police, even strengthening organized crime itself,” the entities state.
According to human rights organizations, the state of São Paulo needs a professional police force that is capable of investigating the most serious crimes, acting within the law and breaking the criminal cycle by attacking the highest levels of organized crime, and “not a police force that generates more violence and death”.
