They were children who looked like me' Netflix show recounts Rio police killings

Netflix show recounts Rio police killings

- Tiago Rogero

For some inhabitants of Rio de Janeiro, the most significant cross of the city's most famous church, Nossa Senhora da Candelária, does not sit on the altar or atop the grand baroque church built in 1775, but outside.

In front of the Candelária church, a wooden cross about 2m (6.5ft) tall bears eight plaques with names. It is the fifth cross placed in the same spot, as the previous four were destroyed. "They've set them on fire, torn its arms off," said Patrícia de Oliveira, 50, one of the leaders of the group Candelária Never Again, which has rebuilt the crosses each time they have been vandalized.

Despite the surveillance cameras in the area, no one has been held accountable for destroying the tribute to victims of one of Brazil's most horrific cases of police violence.

"They destroyed them because the authorities and people in Rio believe that the massacre was necessary to 'clean' society of the undesirables," she said.

At about 11pm on 23 July 1993, eight young people—who were aged between 11 and 19 and were sleeping on the pavement outside the church—were killed by three police officers and a former officer in what became known as the Candelária massacre.

Now, 31 years after it happened, the massacre has become the theme of a new Netflix series, Children of the Church Steps.