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TheCandelária massacre (Portuguese:chacina da Candelária[ʃɐˈsĩnɐðɐkɐ̃deˈlaɾjɐ]) was amass killing inRio de Janeiro,Brazil, on July 23, 1993. During the night, eighthomeless people, including six minors, were killed by a group of men beside theCandelária Church. Several of the men were members of thepolice and were tried for the killings, but only two wereconvicted.
TheCandelária Church is a famous historicRoman Catholic church in centralRio de Janeiro,Brazil. The church itself and the buildings around it in Pius X Square became known as a popular location for possibly hundreds of Rio de Janeiro'sstreet children to form a makeshift home at night. The church's personnel provides food, shelter, education and religious advice to as many of these children as possible. Many of the homeless children are involved with theillegal drug trade andprostitution, and because many of these children also live around the church during the day, police keep a constant watch on the church's surroundings. In the early 1990s, the area around the Candelária Church developed a high crime rate as street children increasingly began to commit criminal activities such aspickpocketing androbbery.
According to survivors, on the morning of July 22, 1993, the day before the massacre, a group of children threw stones at police cars. As the children from the Candelária Church area were usually only given warnings by policemen, the young perpetrators left without worrying too much about the threat. At midnight, severalChevrolet Chevette cars with coveredlicense plates came to a halt in front of the Candelária Church, and the occupants began shooting at the group of roughly seventy street children sleeping in the vicinity of the church.[1]
Subsequently, in the investigations, it was found that the shots were fired by militiamen, that used the square around the church as a selling point for drugs. As a result, six children and teenagers died and several other children and teenagers got injured.[2]
The names of the eight victims are inscribed in a wooden cross, erected in the garden across the church:
The investigation led the police to Wagner dos Santos, one of the teenagers that survived, even though he was hit four times. Santos would suffer a second attack on September 12, 1994, in theCentral do Brasil and from then on, theProsecutor's Office put him on the Witness Protection Program. His testimony was fundamental in the recognition of those involved. Wagner left the country with the help of the federal government and suffers from serious health problems.[3]
During the case, seven people were indicted: the formermilitary police officer Marcus Vinícius Emmanuel Borges, the Military Policemen Cláudio dos Santos and Marcelo Cortes, the locksmith Jurandir Gomes França, Nelson Oliveiras dos Santos, Marco Aurélio Dias de Alcântara and Arlindo Afonso Lisboa Júnior.
Theinternational community severely condemned the attack, and many in Brazil asked for the prosecution of those who shot the Candelária Church children.
According to studies conducted by associations connected to theAmnesty International, forty four of the seventy children that slept in the streets of that region lost their lives in a violent manner. The majority of the young victims were poor and black.[3]
In 2023, 30 years after the massacre, the majority of the survivors had already died or were missing, most famously Sandro Barbosa do Nascimento, that in 2000 orchestrated thebus 174 hijacking and was killed by police; and Elizabeth Cristina de Oliveira Maia, known then as Beth Gorda ("Fat Beth") and one of the leaders of the group of young people that lived in the vicinity of the Candelária Church, that was killed in 2000 by drug dealers, according to the Rio de Janeiro police.[5]
Wagner dos Santos, that had been shot in the Aterro do Flamengo four hours before the massacre, had the role of key-witness in the case. While he recovered in the hospital, Wagner was victim of a second attack, out of the four he suffered after the massacre. Cristina Leonardo, at the time assistant of human rights, helped Wagner and other survivors, and helped him get in the Witness Protection Program.
In front of the church there is a small monument in remembrance of the massacre. It is constituted of a wooden cross, that is inscribed with the names of the victims, and a concrete plate. It has suffered apparent actions of vandalism since it is somewhat damaged and dismembered from its stand and with its epigraph illegible.
Meanwhile, for the 30th anniversary of the massacre, the Rio de Janeiro City Hall renovated the cross and coated the base with granite. The stand and the plate with the information have also been improved.[5]
The massacre was portrayed in an episode of the showLinha Direta ofRede Globo. The event was addressed by the Brazilian death metal band Lacerated and Carbonized in the song "The Candelária Massacre" from their 2013 albumThe Core of Disruption.Blaggers ITA did the same in their 1993 single "Oxygen"[6] It is also portrayed, in a flashback, by the protagonist of the bookO Imperador da Ursa Maior byCarlos Eduardo Novaes. The documentaryBus 174 byJosé Padilha and the movieLast Stop 174 byBruno Barreto, both narrate the history ofSandro Barbosa do Nascimento, one of the massacre's survivors that, seven years later, was the protagonist of the bus 174 hijacking in the same city. A reference to the massacre is also in the gameMetal Gear Rising: Revengeance. In a CODEC conversation, during the ARCHIVE R-02, Kevin and the protagonist Raiden talk about homeless children and mention the massacre. The massacre is fictionalized in the 2024 four-part Netflix series “Children of the Church Steps”, which received mostly favorably reviews.
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