This is what happens when government fails to enforce laws:
Homicides claimed more than 6,000 victims in Rio de Janeiro last year, many of them in gang violence fought by organized crime gangs seeking to control the sale of marijuana and cocaine in the city's favelas, or shantytowns.
As if inter-gang violence were not enough, there is now a new element in the mix. Militias formed by off-duty and former cops, prison guards, and firefighters are moving in to oust the drug gangs and install their own brand of extortion.
“The militias are unquestionably criminal groups,” says Marcelo Freixo, a former human rights activist who studied the phenomenon before being elected to Congress in October. “They push out the traffickers and they charge residents a security tax they are obliged to pay. They control through force but it is not to provide security, it is to make money. One group makes money by selling drugs, the other through terror.”
Continue reading this story at The Christian Science Monitor…
…or, when a government becomes corrupt.
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