People take part in a protest in Sao Paulo, Brazil, on October 31, 2025, to demand justice for victims of a massive police. NELSON ALMEIDA / AFP
Hundreds of protesters on Friday, October 31, marched through one of the favelas targeted in Rio de Janeiro's most lethal police raid that left more than 100 dead, calling for Rio State Governor Cláudio Castro to resign amid continued outrage over the deadly operation. Locals, politicians, activists, grieving mothers who lost their sons in prior operations and people from other Rio neighborhoods gathered to voice their fury in Vila Cruzeiro, part of the Penha complex of favelas, where days prior, residents laid out scores of bodies they had collected from a nearby green area following the raid.
At least 121 people were killed in Tuesday's operation, including four policemen, according to police. Rio's public defender's office says 132 people died. "Coward, terrorist, assassin! His hands are dirty with blood," said Anne Caroline Dos Santos, 30, referring to Castro, an ally of former President Jair Bolsonaro and opponent of leftist President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.
Castro has accused the federal government of abandoning Rio in its fight against organized crime, a claim that Lula's administration has refuted. Dos Santos came from Brazil's biggest favela Rocinha in Rio's southern zone to voice her indignation. Like many other protesters, she accused law enforcement of torture and extrajudicial killings. "Mothers are now battling to retrieve their sons' bodies and bury them," she said, adding that she had lost a friend in the operation.
