Security & Strategic Review - February 2020

Brazil’s police force is notoriously violent, with the high number of homicides committed by the police in Rio de Janeiro usually held up as an example of this. The phenomenon is not restricted to Rio city and state, however. São Paulo, the country’s largest metropolis with a very low (by Brazilian standards) homicide rate of 5.47 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, is also suffering from a surge in police brutality.