Twenty-five alleged members of a gang of Brazilian bank robbers were killed Sunday in a vast police operation in Minas Gerais state, a police source told AFP. “There are 25 criminals who have died, and no injuries,” a federal highway police source told AFP.
The operation by 50 officers, in conjunction with the Military Police, took place near the city of Varginha.
Police raided two farms where “members of a criminal organization specializing in robbing banks and ATMs” were preparing attacks on several local bank branches, the source said.
Eighteen of the suspects were killed on the first farm and seven at the second farm, police said. There were no casualties among the security forces.
The suspects’ identities were not revealed. “It is probably our largest operation against this type of crime in the country.
Many suspects were going to rob banks and were surprised by our intelligence service,” said Captain Layla Brunnela, of the Military Police.
Then, “when we started the operation, we were shot at, so the military had to respond to the unjust attack to protect their lives,” Lieutenant Colonel Rodolfo Morotti Fernandes, commander of the Police Special Operations Battalion, told a briefing in Minas Gerais.—AFP
