The Car Robbery and Theft Police Station (DRFA) of the General Department of Specialized Police (DGPE) and other units of the Civil Police of Rio de Janeiro carried out Operation Oxycut today (27). According to the Secretary of State for Civil Police (Sepol), 20 people were arrested. The agents took to the streets to serve 22 arrest warrants and 40 search and seizure warrants against those involved in a criminal scheme of robbery, theft and receiving vehicles in the state.
Investigations showed that the criminals carried out robberies in the west of the capital and took the cars to the Lagos Region. The agents seized, in the action, several vehicle parts, plates, documents and keys. Four junkyards were targeted by the police. According to Sepol, vehicle parts, in most of the 90s and 2000s, were resold and the group moved around R$ 500 thousand per month.
According to the chief delegate of specialized police, Márcio Braga, the criminals supplied irregular repair shops and auto parts. For him, the operation directly interfered with the criminals’ activities. “In relation to the criminal organization, it was practically dismantled”, said the policeman, in a press conference in Cidade da Polícia, this morning.
The director of the General Department of Specialized Police (DGPE), delegate Pedro Medina, said that the criminal organization used drug trafficking members who were armed, on duty for 12 hours, to carry out criminal enterprises in the peripheral regions of communities. “They would go out, join two or three, implement the theft of vehicles, bring them to the interior of the favela and there they would sell the vehicles with cloning to the dismantling gangs for R$3,000 or R$4,000.”
Investigations continue to locate and arrest the rest of the criminal organization. “The investigations have ramifications. When there is an operation that collects material, we continue with the investigation. From there, other inquiries are formed and other investigations proceed with what was collected”, said the head of the General Department of Specialized Police.
