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The photographer

A photographer who documented the consequences of a large-scale law enforcement action in the Brazilian city has recounted how local people returned with mutilated bodies of the deceased individuals.

The victims "continued arriving: the numbers kept rising", Bruno Itan stated. They included those of police officers.

One individual was discovered headless - others were "severely damaged", he reported. Several bodies showed evidence of blade trauma.

In excess of 120 victims were killed during Tuesday's raid on a criminal gang - the deadliest such raid in the city.

The eyewitness reported that he initially learned about the operation in the early hours by residents from the Alemão area, who contacted him alerting him an armed confrontation was occurring.

The photographer went to the healthcare center, where the casualties were arriving.

The eyewitness reported that security forces stopped members of the press from entering the Penha neighborhood, where the security measures were occurring.

"Law enforcement personnel established a perimeter and announced: 'The press cannot proceed beyond this point'."

However, the photographer, who was raised in the community, reported he succeeded to gain access past the security perimeter, where he continued until dawn.

He described that Tuesday night, local residents commenced searching the mountainous area which divides Penha from the adjacent Alemão area for relatives whose whereabouts were unknown after the operation.

Community members from the Penha area arranged the located casualties in an open area - and Itan's photos show the response of those present.

"The brutality of the situation impacted me profoundly: the grief of the families, parents losing consciousness, women carrying children, crying, furious relatives," the reporter recounted.

The eyewitness

The governor of Rio state stated that the extensive law enforcement effort deploying about 2,500 security personnel was intended to preventing a criminal group referred to as Comando Vermelho from expanding its territory.

Originally, state authorities stated that sixty individuals along with four officers" were fatally injured during the action.

They have since said that their "preliminary" count indicates that 117 "suspects" lost their lives.

Rio's public defender's office, which provides legal assistance to low-income residents, has estimated the overall count of people killed as 132.

Per investigative findings, Red Command stands as the sole illegal faction that in the past few years has managed to make territorial gains in the state of Rio de Janeiro.

It is widely considered among the biggest criminal organizations nationally, together with another major gang, and has a history spanning over five decades.

Per correspondent an expert, who has long reported on criminal activity in the city for years, the gang "operates like a franchise" with local criminal leaders joining the organization and serving as "operational allies".

The organization focuses mainly on drug trafficking, additionally trafficking weapons, gold, fuel, alcohol cigarettes.

Based on official reports, gang members are well armed and officials reported that throughout the operation, they faced assaults from explosive-laden drones.

The state leader of Rio state, the government representative, characterized Red Command members as criminal extremists and called the security forces killed in the raid as courageous individuals.

But the number of people killed during the raid has come in for criticism with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights saying it was "appalled".

During a press briefing the next day, the official justified security actions.

"There was no objective to result in deaths. We aimed to arrest them all alive," he stated.

He added that the circumstances worsened due to the alleged criminals resisted aggressively: "It was a consequence of the resistance they carried out and the overwhelming response by those criminals."

The official further reported that the victims displayed by locals in the neighborhood had been "manipulated".

Through a message on social media, he claimed that some of them had been stripped of the camouflage clothing that he stated they possessed "to redirect responsibility toward law enforcement".

A law enforcement representative from the police department further reported that tactical gear, body armor, and arms" had been removed from the casualties and displayed evidence appearing to show a person removing tactical gear {off a corpse