RIO DE JANEIRO: Brazilian activists have praised a court ruling that has sentenced 23 police officers to some 156 years in jail altogether for their role in the violence that left 111 inmates dead in a prison uprising in 1992. While the ruling came over two decades after the incident, activists told Bikyanews.com that it is “better now than never.” “We have long struggled with accountability with our police force in this country, so any support from the justice system is great,” said 49-year-old Mario Sanchez, who was a 28-year-old activist when the incident went down. “I remember it vividly and the outrage it had on the streets. We wanted justice then, but at least it has finally come,” he told Bikyanews.com. Judge Jose Augusto Marzagao on Sunday sentenced the 23 from among 26 officers on trial before the Sao Paulo state tribunal. Three others were acquitted and dozens more will be tried in the coming months. Under Brazilian law, no one can serve more than 30 years in prison. The officers had originally been charged with killing 15 inmates in Sao Paulo's Carandiru prison, but prosecutors said that two of those prisoners were stabbed to death by fellow inmates. The officers, most of them now retired, are free pending the outcome of their appeal. The defense, which argued that the police officers fired in self-defense after being threatened and assaulted by the prisoners, said it would appeal. None of the officers involved in the operation, which came to be known as the “Carandiru massacre”, were harmed. In addition to the 111 prisoners killed, about 87 others were wounded. Survivors accused police of firing on inmates who had already surrendered or were hiding in their cells. Authorities initially claimed the police were trying to break up a fight between prisoners who had seized control of one of the cell blocks. For activists like Sanchez, it closes a dark moment in Brazil's history and he hopes that it will lead to better policing of the police in the country. “We need to do a better job of ensuring our police cannot get away with murder and corruption. This is a beginning, I hope,” he added. BN
