Like a movie! Band of assailants terrorized an inland city in Sao Paulo to rob two banks. They used explosives, drones and tied hostages to vehicles.
With heavy weapons, explosives and carrying hostages on the roofs of the cars, a gang of assailants terrorized a city in the interior of Sao Paulo on Monday to rob two banks, leaving a balance of three dead.
Dozens of heavily armed men, according to media estimates, took over the streets of downtown Araçatuba, a city of 200,000 inhabitants 500 km northwest of Sao Paulo, at midnight, using drones, explosives and hostages as human shields.
The assailants advanced through the streets firing rifles and threatening several hostages. After robbing two bank branches, they fled placing people on the roof and in the hood of moving cars, according to shocking images displayed by local channels.
Two civilians and a criminal were killed during the action, which left at least six injured, according to police.
At the escape, the hostages were tied to the vehicles. Try to avoid any police counterattack against the group. God save these people and all Araçatuba. All bank branches in the center were attacked: preliminary information. pic.twitter.com/lu0hBlcTCu
– Yuri Macri (@yurimacri) August 30, 2021
The assailants deployed explosives in different parts of the city and surrounded some police stations to delay the arrival of reinforcements.
They wore “bulletproof vests, rifles and helmets,” they looked like “war soldiers,” a witness who asked not to be identified told TV Globus.
Security camera footage shows one of the banks attacked by criminals (and little uncle collecting money from the ground) pic.twitter.com/RH0EdIEtn1
– Kaio Esteves (@kaioesteves) August 30, 2021
“The scenes of terror experienced by the people of Araçatuba will not go unpunished. Two criminals were captured and a third was killed while confronting the police,” said Sao Paulo Governor Joao Doria, who order the deployment of an operation of 380 police to search for the fugitives.
Brazil has recorded other thefts in a similar manner in recent years: a high degree of planning, heavy weapons and practiced in medium-sized cities to ensure an escape route and significant loot in bank vaults.
– Kaio Esteves (@kaioesteves) August 30, 2021
In December last year, two mega-assaults of the same type, just one day apart, were recorded in cities in the interior of the states of Pará (north) and Santa Catarina (south).
A few months earlier, the São Paulo towns of Botucatu and Ourinhos went through similar episodes. According to the Sao Paulo Security Secretariat, both cases were resolved and “much of these gangs are taken.”
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