Murder in 2013 originated gang that leads attacks in RN; understand

Bus burned in the neighborhood of Mãe Luiza, in Natal (RN). Photo: reproduction

Ten years ago, in the early hours of February 21, 2013, prisoners from the largest drug trafficking faction in São Paulo, the PCC, invaded a cell in pavilion 2 of the Alcaçuz Penitentiary, in Rio Grande do Norte, and stabbed Lindemberg de Melo to death. and Souza, known as Berg Neguinho. Berg’s murder changed the history of organized crime in Rio Grande do Norte, as reported by the newspaper O Globo.

Before being killed, Berg, who was a member of the gang, had killed a partner with whom he had a falling out during an attempt to escape. The crime took place four years earlier and, according to the gang’s rules, “blood is paid for with blood”.

After the episode, many cronies did not accept the summit’s decision and broke with the gang. In the weeks that followed, dissidents banded together to found the Crime Syndicate within Alcaçuz—the faction behind the wave of violence that terrorized the state last week. The new faction, however, was formed along the same lines as the São Paulo gang.

Soon after Berg’s murder, the faction left the prisons and spread to the outskirts of Grande Natal and other cities.

“In jail, criminals began to say that they would not accept orders from another state, that the local faction was in charge in Rio Grande do Norte”, explains Juliana Melo, an anthropologist and professor at the Federal University of Rio Grande do Norte.

Currently, the Potiguar faction holds a monopoly on drug trafficking in the state. Rivals are concentrated in Mossoró. What is at stake in the dispute, in addition to the internal market, is also a strategic point on the international trafficking route.

According to an investigation by the Federal Police (PF), Rio Grande do Norte receives drugs that enter through the borders in the north of the country, pass through Acre, Rondônia and Amazonas, and are sent to Europe.