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Bruno Itan

A reporter who witnessed the results of an extensive law enforcement action in the metropolitan area has reported how local people returned with disfigured remains of those who had died.

The casualties "kept coming: the numbers kept rising", the eyewitness stated. They included security forces.

One individual was discovered headless - others were "totally disfigured", he said. Many also had evidence of stab wounds.

More than 120 people were killed during Tuesday's raid on a criminal gang - the deadliest such raid the municipality has seen.

The eyewitness stated that he initially learned concerning the action Tuesday morning by local people from the Alemão area, who contacted him telling him an armed confrontation was occurring.

The photographer traveled to a local medical facility, where the bodies were arriving.

The eyewitness reported that law enforcement blocked media personnel from going into the operation zone, where the security measures were taking place.

"Police officers established a perimeter and said: 'Media representatives doesn't get past here'."

But Itan, who spent his childhood in the area, explained he succeeded to make his way into the restricted zone, where he remained until the next morning.

He described that evening, local residents started looking the mountainous area that borders the community of Penha and the nearby Alemão neighbourhood for relatives who were unaccounted for following the security action.

Residents from the Penha area arranged the located casualties in a public space - the documented evidence reveal the reaction of the gathered crowd.

"The violence of what occurred affected me a lot: the grief of the families, women collapsing, women carrying children, weeping, angry family members," the eyewitness remembered.

The eyewitness

The official of the state announced that the massive police operation deploying about 2,500 officers was designed to halting a gang known as the criminal faction from increasing their control.

Originally, the Rio state government maintained that sixty individuals plus four law enforcement personnel" were fatally injured in the raid.

Authorities later reported that their "preliminary" count suggests that 117 "suspects" lost their lives.

The public legal service, which provides legal assistance to the poor, has estimated the final tally of people killed as 132.

Based on expert analysis, Red Command represents the unique criminal entity which in recent years has been able to make territorial gains across the region.

It is widely considered one of the two largest gangs nationally, together with a rival criminal group, featuring a timeline spanning over five decades.

Per reporter a specialist, with extensive experience documenting illegal operations in Rio extensively, the criminal organization "works as a system" with area gang leaders joining the organization and acting as "commercial associates".

The organization engages primarily in drug trafficking, while also dealing in weapons, gold, energy resources, beverages cigarettes.

Per law enforcement statements, criminal affiliates have substantial firearms and police said that during the raid, they came under attack via weaponized unmanned aircraft.

The official of the region, the political leader, described gang affiliates as "narcoterrorists" and referred to the four police officers who died during the operation as courageous individuals.

Nevertheless, the total of people killed in the security action has faced scrutiny with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights saying it was "shocked".

In a media appearance on Wednesday, the state leader supported law enforcement.

"We did not plan to kill anyone. We wanted to arrest them all alive," he said.

He added that the circumstances had escalated because the suspects fought back: "It was a consequence of the resistance they implemented and the overwhelming response from the gang members."

The governor further reported that the victims displayed by locals in the neighborhood had been "tampered with".

Through a message through digital channels, he said that some of them had been stripped of the camouflage clothing he said they had been wearing "in order to shift blame onto the police".

Felipe Curi representing security forces additionally stated that "camouflage clothing, body armor, and arms" had been removed from the casualties and presented video appearing to show a person cutting camouflage clothing {off a corpse