The balance of power in Rio de Janeiro is shifting in favour of the para-military militias and the Comando Vermelho (CV), one of Brazil's two largest organised crime groups along with the Primeiro Comando da Capital (PCC).

The CV and the PCC both originated in the Brazilian prison system: the former in late 1970s in Rio de Janeiro and the latter in São Paulo in 1990s. Prison is still the place that houses the main leaders of the two criminal organisations, while their members are mostly recruited in the metropolitan suburbs and favelas.

At the end of 1990s, the CCP managed to eliminate the other criminal groups operating in the São Paulo prison system, achieving hegemony and almost total control of the prisoners in the State of São Paulo. A hegemony that extended - and still extends today - to the control of drug trafficking within the State itself. The CV, on the other hand, has been less effective, so much so that it has failed to completely eliminate rival gangs within the local prison system and, above all, in the favelas and other poor neighbourhoods of Rio de Janeiro.

Until a few months ago, when the CV intensified its actions to regain control of the territories that had been in the hands of paramilitary militias for more than a decade, an emanation of the so-called Liga da Justiça, a reference to the DC Comics superhero group called Justice League, whose symbol is the shield of the comic book character Batman. Present mainly in the city of Rio de Janeiro, these militias originated in the 1990s as paramilitary groups to protect - at least officially - the population from the actions of criminal gangs involved in drug trafficking. They are in practice members or former members of state bodies - policemen, fire fighters, prison guards and military personnel - who exploit their belonging to state institutions to sell protection to residents of the poorest neighbourhoods of Rio de Janeiro.

An officer of the PMERJ (Polícia Militar do Estado do Rio de Janeiro) assigned to the famous BOPE (Batalhão de Operações Policiais Especiais, in the picture) explains that “this extortion activity to provide supposed protection has generated others, both legal and illegal, such as the sale of gas and cable TV, Internet access, water and electricity distribution, public transport, real estate and civil construction. This form of monopoly, which prevents public and private enterprises from operating freely, constitutes an important source of income for the militias and allows them to reinforce their control over the community.”

Today, standing out in these activities are the two most significant paramilitary groups, namely the Escritório do Crime and the Bonde do Zinho. Last summer, the Favela do Rio das Pedras, controlled by paramilitary militias, was subjected to almost daily attacks by armed groups of the CV, who attempted to take over this area of the Zona Oeste of Rio de Janeiro. In the meantime, at least 3 neighbourhoods or favelas in Rio have come under the effective control of the CV and 4 others, including the one just mentioned in Rio das Pedras, are literally under siege.

“Although over the last two years the paramilitary militias have lost around 20% of the territories they controlled, they still remain strongly entrenched in Rio, where no less than 50% of the city is still under their control, thanks also, and above all, to their close political and institutional ties. Having said this, we have noted a noticeable decrease in the armed presence, particularly in the favelas, by the paramilitary militias, which are slowly yielding terrain to the increasingly aggressive CV,” believes the PMERJ officer.

For more than a decade, paramilitary militias have dominated a large part of Rio de Janeiro's criminal economy through extortion, drug trafficking and control of public services, thanks also, as just mentioned, to the close links they maintain with government officials and security forces.

“Militias have a method of territorial economic exploitation and maintaining political support that differentiates them from CV or other criminal groups,” confirms the PMERJ officer.

In the meantime, however, the CV has expanded its criminal catalogue by entering sectors long dominated by paramilitary militias, such as the real estate market, financing construction projects and selling flats. Since 2022, the CV has made significant progress in recapturing key neighbourhoods in Rio de Janeiro, previously under the control of paramilitary militias, although its criminal reputation is likely to make it more difficult to maintain long-term control of the territory. In the favelas, the CV operates in the form of a ‘parallel government’, exercising almost total control over the ‘physical’ territory, patrolling and monitoring access points to counter any actions by rival groups or interventions by law enforcement agencies, especially BOPE operatives, well known for not being too subtle.

“For the population, the CV now represents much more than just a criminal group, by virtue of its links with so many people born and raised in these deprived areas, and this gives it a certain legitimacy. The precarious conditions of detention in prisons, both in Rio de Janeiro and in other large Brazilian metropolises, also generate all sorts of deprivations, which have brought prisoners and their families closer to organised crime groups, giving rise to networks of solidarity in the poorest neighbourhoods. Today, for many young people in Rio's favelas, CV unfortunately represents a form of social inclusion, not to say an ideal of emancipation,” the PMERJ officer bitterly concludes.

The recent intensification of police operations in the areas controlled by the para-military militias, such as the one that took place last June in the Favela do Rondo, in which one of its leaders, Rui Paulo Gonçalves Estevão, known as Pipito, lost his life in a gunfight, could further weaken them, leading to further territorial losses in favour of the CV, which is spreading its presence like wildfire.

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