Brazilian police found guilty in 1995 land massacre

RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil (Reuters) -- Two Brazilian police officers were found guilty on Friday of murdering squatters during a 1995 land dispute in the first phase of a landmark trial that could deal a blow to what many view as widespread police impunity.

One officer was sentenced to 18 years in prison and another to 16 years for the murder of three peasants, a spokesman at the court in the northern state of Rondonia told Reuters.

"It's a step in the right direction toward ending immunity, which is the rule in land conflicts," said James Cavallaro, founder of the Global Justice Centre in Brazil.

The policemen can appeal the ruling. A third officer was acquitted after his defence argued that someone else had used his gun during the standoff, according to Globo television.

The trial of nine more police and two peasants charged in the deaths of 11 people during the clash will continue in the city of Porto Velho on Monday.

The massacre occurred on Aug. 9, 1995, when Rondonia's state police stormed a landless squatters camp in Corumbiara, 520 miles (832 kilometres) from Porto Velho, to evict them.

Prosecutors argue that some of the peasants were executed after the squatters had been subdued. Reports showed some of the peasants had been shot at point-blank range in the neck and that police had fired 1,800 rounds of ammunition, compared with 200 rounds from the peasants' guns.

The two men sentenced on Friday were only found guilty of killing three peasants after the clash had ended. Prosecutors had been seeking 30-year sentences, the maximum allowable under Brazilian law, for the killing of nine peasants.

Two landless activists are also being tried for the murder of two police officers during the dispute.

Land inequalities in Brazil - where almost half of the arable land is owned by just 1 percent of the population - were denounced internationally following the 1995 incident, known as the Corumbiara Massacre.

A year later, 19 peasants were killed in a notorious standoff with police in Carajas in another north Amazon state, Para.

Last year, a court acquitted the three officers charged in the 1996 Carajas massacre, but a judge has since annulled the decision, which sparked outrage among human rights groups and drew criticism from President Fernando Henrique Cardoso.

Some 1,100 rural labourers have been killed in land disputes over the past 12 years and only 86 of the killings have resulted in trials, according to Cavallaro.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Republica Federativa do Brasil
Landless Workers' Movement (MST)

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