The casualties continued piling up - reporter shares lethal Rio law enforcement operation

Bruno Itan

A photographer who documented the results of an extensive security raid in the Brazilian city has reported how residents came back with mutilated bodies of the deceased individuals.

The victims "continued arriving: 25, 30, 35, 40, 45...", the photographer reported. The total contained security forces.

One individual had been decapitated - additional victims were "completely mutilated", he explained. Many also had what appeared to be blade trauma.

In excess of 120 victims lost their lives during Tuesday's raid on a criminal gang - the bloodiest action Rio has experienced.

The photographer stated that he initially learned to the raid in the early hours by community members from the Alemão area, who contacted him telling him there was a shoot-out.

The photographer made his way to the healthcare center, where the casualties were arriving.

Itan explained that security forces prevented journalists from accessing the operation zone, where the police action were occurring.

"Security forces established a perimeter and announced: 'Media representatives are not allowed to pass'."

Nevertheless, the eyewitness, who was raised in the area, reported he managed to gain access into the restricted zone, where he continued until dawn.

He described that Tuesday night, local residents started looking the elevated terrain which divides the Penha neighborhood from the nearby Alemão neighbourhood for family members who were unaccounted for since the police raid.

Residents living in Penha organized the recovered bodies in an open area - and Itan's photos reveal the emotions of the people there.

"The brutality of it all impacted me deeply: the grief of loved ones, women collapsing, expectant spouses, sobbing, angry family members," the eyewitness remembered.

The photographer

The governor of the state announced that the massive police operation involving around 2,500 law enforcement members was intended to stopping a gang called Comando Vermelho from increasing their control.

Initially, state authorities maintained that sixty individuals along with four officers" lost their lives during the action.

Authorities later reported that their "preliminary" count suggests that 117 alleged criminals were fatally injured.

Rio's public defender's office, that gives legal support to low-income residents, has calculated the final tally of fatalities to be 132.

According to researchers, the gang stands as the sole illegal faction which in recent years has been able to make territorial gains in the state of Rio de Janeiro.

It is widely considered one of the two largest gangs in Brazil, together with another major gang, with a background spanning over five decades.

According to Brazilian journalist an expert, who has been covering illegal operations in Rio for years, the criminal organization "functions as a network" with area gang leaders forming part of the gang and becoming "operational allies".

The criminal group focuses mainly on drug trafficking, additionally trafficking guns, valuable minerals, energy resources, liquor smoking products.

Based on official reports, criminal affiliates are well armed and police said that while the action was underway, they encountered resistance via weaponized unmanned aircraft.

The state leader of the state, the political leader, labeled Red Command members as drug terrorists and described the law enforcement personnel who died during the operation as brave public servants.

But the number of casualties in the security action has come in for criticism with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights saying it was "shocked".

At a news conference on Wednesday, the state leader defended the police force.

"We did not plan to result in deaths. We aimed to arrest them all alive," he said.

He added that the events intensified as the individuals resisted aggressively: "It resulted of the resistance they implemented and the excessive violence from the gang members."

The state leader also said that the bodies displayed by locals in the area had been "manipulated".

In a post on online platforms, he claimed that some of them had been stripped of military-style attire that he stated they possessed "to redirect responsibility onto the police".

A police official representing security forces also said that military attire, vests, and firearms" were taken away from the casualties and displayed evidence seemingly depicting a man stripping military attire {off a corpse