Kidnapping
February 17, 2004

I just gave a class to one of my better students Eliane. When I arrived she immediately told me she was pretty depressed and explained why. One of her best friends from childhood was in a bad situation. Her husband, a sucessful self made businessman, had been kidnapped about 4 months ago in São Paulo. In January the wife negotiated with the kidnappers and paid ransom to them, but it wan't enough and they said they wouldn't release him. She hasn't heard back from them since. Eliane was with her over the weekend and it was still upsetting her.

I've always wondered why kidnapping is so much more popular here in Brasil than in the US. It ranges from grabbing the super-rich down to more street level stuff where you'll get dragged to your ATM machine to take out money.

Eliane told me there's a theory about the popularity of kidnapping in Brasil... especially Rio and São Paulo.

Years ago there was a prison on Ilha Grande and it was home to both political and criminal prisoners. Many of the political prisoners were products of the military dictatorship and many of them participated in kidnappings. When they finally got to Ilha Grande, after being tortured, etc.., they participated in an exchange of ideas with the criminal guys (drug dealers, etc...). Thus was born criminal based inner city kidnapping in Brasil... at least it's one theory.

Posted by Scott at 04:03 PM