Pinheirinho slum bravely resists to criminal eviction in Sao Jose dos Campos, SP, Brazil
There are about two weeks, approximately 10 000 poor workers who occupy a land size since 2004 in São José dos Campos, Sao Paulo, were preparing to resist the action eviction that the São Paulo governor Alckmin announced by the press . The land belongs to the bankrupt company Selecta S / A, which is debt in about 10 million dollars with the city of Sao Jose dos Campos.During these two weeks, residents of the occupation, known as Pinheirinho, erected barricades, improvised weapons and shields and promised to confront the police if the forced eviction was in fact carried out.
In the early morning of Sunday Jan. 22, more than 2,000metropolitan policemen and civil guards arrived on the scene with an apparatus of war. The mayor of Sao Jose dos Campos, Eduardo Cury, went on to say on the local TV Vanguard TV the repossession would be peaceful. However, several videos were posted by residents on the Internet denouncing the abuses committed by police and the GCM on the workers.
There are several people injured and detained. Information of the occupation inhabitants talk about deaths and missing persons. The Municipal Guard used lethal bullets against the population. The movement lawyer Donizete Antonio Ferreira, Tom, and the president of the Union of conductors, José Carlos, were wounded by rubber bullets shots and tear gas. Even injured children were treated in Emergency Care Units (PSU). Supplies of water, electricity and telephones were cut in the region.
The population of the surrounding neighborhood is outraged with the violence of the police action carried out throughout the day. At Residencial União e Campo dos Alemães, the population rebelled by throwing stones at the soldiers. They tried to tear down the tents set up to reallocate the inhabitants of Pinheirinho. They came to break down the bars of the Multipurpose Sports Centre Field of the Germans, where local residents are being taken to triage.(Information Network Against Violence).
The inhabitants of Pinheirinho resisted bravely, as they said they would. Sticks and stones were used by protesters against the riot police, who responded with rubber bullets shots and tear gas. According to reports from residents, a man would have been seriously injured after being hit by a shot of lethal ammunition fired by the GCM. Several cars were torched by the mass fury. Among them was the Mobile Unit TV Vanguard Journalism, an affiliate of Brazilian TV Globo.
Information from several fronts, not yet official, continues to confirm that the Pinheirinho deaths actually occurred during the raid today. There are reports that give account of seven dead, among of them a 3 year old child. There are reports that the local hospital confirmed at least three deaths. Many villagers are injured, and among them even women and children were beaten.
One resident injured by bullets, the mason’s apprentice David Castor Washington Furtado, 32,has undergone surgery and remains hospitalized at the Municipal Hospital and may become paraplegic.
The activist and leader of MTST, William Boulos, was beaten by dozens of police officers , taken to the hospital and then was sent to jail. Along with it, officially, another 16 people were arrested during the resistance.
There many difficulties to get accurate information concerning the eviction, due to the siege police do not allow any approach and also on the account of the arrest of many activists.
In a statement, policy, military said that the enviction was peaceful and the TV program Fantastico, from Globo Network, the Community Pinheirinho was accused of being a Cracolândia (where crack addicted use drugs).
