Investigation and Analysis of Organized Crime

InSight Crime

Brazil

Brazil Profile

Brazil, Latin America’s largest economy, has seen some important security advances in recent years, taking dozens of communities in Rio de Janeiro from criminal gangs through its innovative UPP security program. However, it faces a serious threat from its two largest domestic criminal gangs, the First Capital Command (Primeiro Comando Capital - PCC) and Red Command (Comando Vermelho), who are becoming increasingly involved in the international drug trade, as well as operating extortion and kidnapping rings at home. Militia groups composed mostly of police are another source of violent crime, extorting entire neighborhoods and carrying out extrajudicial killings. The country is becoming increasingly important as a market and transit point for cocaine. Read more

News

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Which Accusation Could Bring Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro Down?

The accusations, both legal and political, against Brazil’s President Jair...

Groups

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Family of the North – FDN

Family of the North (Familia do Norte - FDN) has long been Brazil’s...

Personalities

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Marcelo Fernando Pinheiro Veiga, alias “Piloto”

Marcelo “Piloto” Pinheiro was considered one of the Brazilian...

Groups

Family of the North – FDN

Red Command

The Red Command (Comando Vermelho) is Brazil’s oldest criminal group, created in a Rio de Janeiro prison in the 1970s as a self-protection group for prisoners. It started out with low-level crime like muggings and bank robbery, but in the 1980s the group moved into the cocaine trade, working with Colombian drug cartels and taking on a social leadership role in many of Rio’s favelas.

First Capital Command – PCC

The First Capital Command (Primeiro Comando da Capital - PCC) was inspired by the Red Command (Comando Vermelho). Both criminal organizations were formed by prisoners as self-protection groups in Brazil’s brutal prison system. The PCC arose in São Paulo in the 1990s, and has fought a bloody ongoing feud with police in the city. The group, now the largest and best-organized criminal organization in Brazil, is believed to have members in two-thirds of the country's states, and controls drug trafficking routes between Brazil, Bolivia, and Paraguay.

Pure Third Command

Amigos dos Amigos

Personalities

Marcelo Fernando Pinheiro Veiga, alias “Piloto”

Gilberto Aparecido Dos Santos, alias ‘Fuminho’

Marcos Willians Herbas Camacho, alias ‘Marcola’

Antônio Francisco Bonfim Lopes, alias ‘Nem’

News

Analysis / May 8, 2020

Which Accusation Could Bring Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro Down?

The accusations, both legal and political, against Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro have come in thick and fast: alleged interference in police affairs, trying...

Analysis / April 23, 2020

Coronavirus Clemency: Detainees Seek Freedom Across Latin America

As the coronavirus crisis exposes the strains on Latin America’s notoriously overcrowded prison system, members of the region’s criminal elite are seeking...

Brief / April 22, 2020

Theft of Critical Medical Equipment Surges in Latin America

Thefts of tests, ventilators and personal protective equipment have shot up across Latin America amid the coronavirus pandemic, threatening lives and taxing...

Analysis / April 21, 2020

Ucayali, Peru’s Drug Trafficking Gateway to Bolivia and Brazil

The coronavirus pandemic has halted trafficking in Peru and sent cocaine prices plummeting, but drug seizures continue in the border department of Ucayali, a...

Brief / April 17, 2020

Arrest of Top Trafficker Unlikely to Slow Growth of Brazil’s PCC

A high-profile drug trafficker connected to Brazil’s PCC has been captured in Mozambique. The surprise ending to a 21-year manhunt raises interesting questions...

Analysis / March 31, 2020

What Does Coronavirus Mean for Criminal Governance in Latin America?

A number of criminal groups across Latin America are ordering ceasefires and exerting control over local communities as fears of the coronavirus sweep across the...

Analysis / March 24, 2020

Coronavirus Lays Bare Faultlines of Latin American Prisons

Fears of contagion amid the coronavirus pandemic have spurred deadly riots, mass breakouts, and crackdowns in several Latin American prisons, exposing how long-term...

Brief / March 9, 2020

PCC’s Rapid Expansion Topic of Debate at InSight Crime Conference

Thanks to a combination of great organizational capacity, control of prisons, high levels of loyalty among its members and dominance of key criminal economies, the...

Analysis / March 5, 2020

Capital Murder: 2019 Homicide Rates in Latin America’s Capital Cities

In a year marked by political and criminal turmoil, Latin American capitals did not escape the effects of the violence, organized crime and state repression...

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