A RIO DE JANEIRO SLUM CREDITS SHADOWY VIGILANTES FOR SAFETY

Slum Rio das Pedras Is Seen as Urban Utopia By Residents Who Cheer
Lack of Crime, Drugs

RIO DE JANEIRO -- For Maria de Lourdes Luna, home is a one-room hut
shared with five relatives. The stench of sewage fills the alleys, and
refuse gushes past the shanties from an open ditch after a hard rain.

Yet for her and many others, the slum of Rio das Pedras is an urban
utopia -- one of the few Brazilian shantytowns, or favelas, not
tormented by drugs and drug-related violence. Children fly kites and
play ball free from fear of ricocheting bullets. People sleep with
doors unlocked and windows ajar. Even petty crime is rare.

"There's no better place to live. This is paradise," says Ms. Luna, a
43-year-old housekeeper. "We can put up with anything -- rats, floods,
trash -- as long as we're spared drugs."

Behind that tranquility and order, however, is a dark secret:
Residents believe that a shadowy organization of civilian vigilantes,
comprised of off-duty and retired policemen as well as ordinary
citizens, keeps the peace by meting out extrajudicial killings to drug
dealers and other lawbreakers. Alleged militia murders provide an
ironic sense of comfort in a city so inured to drug-related violence
that extreme measures aren't considered extreme anymore.

People who live in Rio das Pedras are coy about talking openly of the
informal "policia." But they condone the principle of selective
violence against troublemakers for the sake of preserving community
peace. "It's better to have this than violence against honest folks
and innocent children," says Maria Jose, Ms. Luna's sister, a mother
of four who has lived in the favela for 11 years. "The only people who
die in Rio das Pedras are people who deserve to die."

Once Brazil was primarily a transit point for illicit drugs produced
in Colombia, Bolivia and Peru. Now, it's the world's second-largest
consumer of cocaine , after the U.S., according to the State
Department. Rio de Janeiro's 680 slums, home to almost a quarter of
the city's nine million residents, are the main battlegrounds. The
teeming, hilly settlements are perfect bases and hideouts for drug
rings. Drug lords control entry into most of them. At night, favela
lanes crackle with firefights between police and drug gangs, whose
arsenals include automatic weapons and even shoulder-fired rockets.

Children as young as 12 are recruited into the illicit trade. More
than 2,000 adolescents were killed in the city last year, mostly
related to drugs. Just a few miles from Rio das Pedras is the chaos of
Cidade de Deus, or City of God, the subject of a film by that name
that's startling American audiences with its portrayal of preteen drug
traffickers who kill without thinking twice.

Rio's drug gangs recently extended their tyranny beyond the favelas,
shutting down shops, torching buses and launching grenades in swanky
districts. Last week, state Governor Rosinha Matheus fired the
security czar and replaced him with her husband and predecessor,
Anthony Garotinho. Mr. Garotinho plans a shakeup in the top brass of
the police force.

Rio das Pedras -- literally, "River of Stones" -- stands in sharp
contrast to the mayhem. A hodgepodge of rough-brick, two-story hovels
and cardboard shacks with tin roofs, it has been one of the city's
fastest-growing slums. It's now home to about 80,000 people, up from
60,000 three years ago. Bakeries, food stores, pet shops, beauty
salons and ice-cream parlors attract people from outlying areas.
Youngsters from nearby middle-class districts boogie at The Castle, a
dance hall.

Sirlene Ferreira, a loan officer for a microcredit agency, says she
doesn't venture into certain parts of the notorious Cidade de Deus in
broad daylight. But Rio das Pedras is "so calm," she says, "I don't
have a worry in the world."

The widespread belief in a militia "reinforces good conduct and
provides emotional comfort in a place that could be just another
desolate slum," says Laura Moutinho, a social anthropologist who
co-authored a book about Rio das Pedras.

[Josinaldo Francisco da Cruz]Josinaldo Francisco da Cruz, president of
the residents' association, says that a vigilante force existed in the
1970s, but no more. Still, he notes that residents are "determined to
keep the peace with whatever weapons are at their disposal."

Local police don't mince words about vigilante activity: "It is good
for the community, because innocent folks aren't caught in the
crossfire between armed drug traffickers and police," says Mario
Henrique de Oliveira Alves, chief officer at the 16th police precinct,
whose turf includes Rio das Pedras. "It's better for the police, too.
We don't have to make incursions."

The police can't say how many killings occurred in Rio das Pedras last
year in part because the 16th precinct is one of the few police
stations in the city that doesn't store information on a computer.
Anecdotal evidence suggests there were at least a few.

One apparent case of vigilantism involved Marcelo Santos de Souza, who
was born and raised in the slum, and as a child enjoyed playing
marbles in the alleys and soccer in the fields. But in his teens, Mr.
Souza stole T-shirts and shorts that surfers left on nearby Barra da
Tijuca beach. He graduated to snatching purses, wallets and
cellphones. He got into drugs.

"For 10 years we tried to get him to change his ways," says Jurandir
Alcides, 28, who grew up with Mr. Souza and runs a corn stall. "He was
tarnishing Rio das Pedras' reputation."

It came as no surprise to relatives when Mr. Souza was killed just
before Christmas at the age of 24. Peter Santos de Souza says his
cousin was shot multiple times at close range and his body was dumped
in a deserted lot. He and other relatives decline to finger the
vigilantes and refuse to blame anyone for the murder, except perhaps
Mr. Souza himself.

"He was asking for trouble," says Maria Helena Santos Pierre, an aunt
who helped raise Mr. Souza. "I still believe this is the best place to
live; nothing diminishes that fact." The most any of Mr. Souza's
relatives will say on the subject of vigilantism is this: "It's not
good, but it's better than nothing," says Clarita Pierre, a cousin.
"Without it, this place would be overrun by drug traffickers."

For years, Raimundo Bezerra da Silva had been stealing from shoe
shops, grocery stores and other businesses. His brother-in-law,
Antonio Francisco Cosmo, says Mr. da Silva brought cocaine into the
community. "We did everything we could to put him on the right track,"
says Mr. Cosmo, noting that he paid for driving lessons in the hope
that Mr. da Silva would land a job as a driver.

One night in May 2001, shortly after closing his shop, Mr. Cosmo said
he heard a gunshot -- a rarity in Rio das Pedras. He ran toward the
sound, only to find the 18-year-old Mr. da Silva dead from a single
bullet to the head. The family doesn't know who killed Mr. da Silva
but assumes it was vigilantes.

Neither Mr. Souza's nor Mr. da Silva's family reported the deaths to
the police. Residents say the last thing they want is a stronger
police presence or even a neighborhood police station, because police
in other slums are corrupt and have even bred violence.

Despite the poverty and filth, the absence of drug crime has created a
strong sense of pride and belonging in Rio das Pedras. The pull is so
strong that when the government periodically removes families from the
favela's flood-prone areas and gives them housing elsewhere, many end
up returning -- or longing to.

When Jaciara Santos was forced by the government to leave last year,
the state gave her family a larger brick house in a new public
development an hour's bus ride away. But Ms. Santos has put up a "for
sale" sign and intends to return to Rio das Pedras, even if she has to
live in a shack. Her new environment "is not appropriate for raising
children." she says.

"In Rio das Pedras, you live in peace. People watch over the
community."