Violence as a Message: How the First Capital Command (PCC) Uses Executions to Project Power and Defy the State
The scene, with its cinematic brutality, unfolded in broad daylight on the São Paulo coast on Monday 15 September 2025. A high-speed chase, an SUV forcing a car against a bus, and then, the final act: three men get out armed with assault rifles and fire more than 20 times at the cornered driver. The target was no ordinary citizen. He was Ruy Ferraz Fontes, 63, former chief of the Polícia Civil do Estado de São Paulo (São Paulo Civil Police), one of the most notorious and persistent enemies of the First Capital Command (Primeiro Comando da Capital: PCC). Although the crime’s authorship is still under official investigation, the modus operandi and the victim’s history bear what experts classify as the signature of a “mafia crime,” pointing strongly to the faction. The execution was designed as a spectacle of power, a probable symbolic declaration of war, and what may be the culmination of a long and bloody history of confrontation between the criminal organization and the State.
This act, due to its audacity and the victim’s profile, cannot be seen in isolation. Everything indicates that it is part of a calculated and multifaceted strategy in which the PCC uses extreme violence not as an end, but as a sophisticated communication tool. The PCC is often referred to as the Partido do Crime (“Party of Crime”). Each execution, each attack, is a carefully crafted message intended to intimidate enemies, discipline traitors, and, above all, project an image of omnipotence, affirming that no one, be it a judge, a prosecutor, a senator, or an informant, is beyond the reach of the “Party of Crime.” The death of Fontes, coupled with the recent and equally audacious execution of informant Vinicius Gritzbach at Guarulhos Airport, with the participation of an active-duty military police officer, poses a direct challenge to the sovereignty of the State. The question that arises is whether the state’s response will be another chapter in the vicious cycle of retaliation and abuse, or if it will represent a paradigm shift, focused on the intelligence and financial disruption that can, in fact, weaken the organization.
The Doctrine of Violence: From Prison Manifesto to Corporate Strategy
To understand the logic behind the PCC’s violence, one must go back to its origins. Founded in 1993 in the aftermath of the Carandiru Massacre, the faction was born with a discourse of “fighting against the oppression” of the prison system. Its original statute is a manifesto that frames violence against the State as a just war, a legitimate response to the injustices suffered by the prison population. This ideological narrative, which promises “Liberty, Justice, and Peace,” provides the moral framework that justifies, in the eyes of its members, the most brutal acts.
However, the organization evolved. The leadership of Marco Willians Herbas Camacho, “Marcola,” marked a transition from a mentality of direct confrontation to a more strategic and business-like approach. The “May Crimes” of 2006 were a turning point. On that occasion, in retaliation for the transfer of its leaders to a maximum-security prison, the PCC paralyzed São Paulo with a wave of attacks that resulted in 564 deaths. It was the ultimate demonstration of its firepower and mobilization. However, the state repression that followed, equally violent and often indiscriminate, caused severe financial losses for the faction, disrupting trafficking routes and operations.
The lesson was learned: all-out war was economically unsustainable. Experts point out that after 2006, the PCC recalibrated its strategy. Indiscriminate violence gave way to surgical and high-value symbolic executions. The objective was no longer to paralyze society but to send terrifying messages to specific targets, minimizing the disruption of the faction’s lucrative businesses. The spectacularization of force remained fundamental but became more selective and performative. Violence ceased to be just an act of war and became a tool of governance and terror marketing.
A Gallery of Targets: The Message Behind Each Death
The PCC’s list of targets over the years reveals the precision of this new strategy. Each attack is directed at individuals who represent a direct threat to the organization’s power structure, finances, or internal discipline.
The first major message was sent to the Judiciary in March 2003, with the execution of supervising judge Antonio José Machado Dias, “Machadinho,” in retaliation for the strict treatment he imposed on the imprisoned leaders. Marcola was convicted as the mastermind, setting the precedent that no pillar of the State was immune. Years later, prosecutor Lincoln Gakiya, who specializes in unraveling the faction’s complex financial web, became a persistent target, especially after orchestrating Marcola’s transfer to the federal prison system in 2019, a measure that caused “great financial damage” to the group. The same transfer put the then Minister of Justice, Sergio Moro, in the crosshairs, culminating in the discovery of a complex plan to kidnap and assassinate the now-senator and his family.
The assassination of Ruy Ferraz Fontes in September 2025 seems to represent the conclusion of a long-standing revenge project. Fontes was not just a police officer; he was the architect of the indictment of the entire PCC leadership in 2006, a historical enemy. The fact that he was killed when he was already retired from the front lines, serving as a municipal secretary, sends an unequivocal message, regardless of the final authorship: for his enemies, there is no amnesty. Retirement does not grant immunity, and the memory of organizations like the PCC is long.
Just as potent was the execution of Antônio Vinicius Gritzbach in November 2024. A former collaborator who became an informant, Gritzbach was gunned down in the arrivals area of Guarulhos Airport, one of the busiest in the country. The choice of location was a demonstration of absolute audacity and impunity. The message was clear: betrayal is punished by death, no matter where the target is.
The most frightening detail, however, was the identity of one of the shooters: an active-duty military police corporal. Gritzbach, aware of the danger, had refused official state protection, opting to hire his own escort of off-duty police officers. Ironically, his protector was his executioner. This fact reveals the most dangerous facet of the PCC’s evolution: its ability to infiltrate and corrupt the very institutions tasked with combating it. The message, in this case, was devastating: not even the State can protect you, as its agents may be the executioners in the service of the faction.
The Turning Point: Breaking the Cycle of Violence
The assassination of Ruy Ferraz Fontes, the man who personified the State’s fight against the PCC, represents a turning point. It is a direct challenge that demands a commensurate response, but one that cannot be a mere repetition of failed formulas. The State’s instinctive reaction to these acts of defiance has historically been violent and widespread repression. The response to the May 2006 attacks, for example, was marked by a wave of summary executions that victimized hundreds of people, many with no proven connection to crime, according to denunciations by human rights organizations. More recent operations, such as Operação Escudo (“Operation Shield”) beginning in July 2023, followed a similar pattern of high lethality and allegations of abuse, creating a cycle of retaliation that, in the end, only strengthens the PCC’s narrative that it fights against an oppressive State, facilitating its recruitment in marginalized communities.
This “war on crime” strategy has proven not only ineffective but counterproductive. It focuses on the symptoms, the violence on the streets, and not the cause: the faction’s corporate structure and economic power. The PCC is no longer just a gang; it is a multinational criminal corporation with sophisticated logistical operations and a billion-dollar revenue.
The forceful response that the moment demands must, therefore, be an intelligence-based response. The path was shown by operations like Operação Carbono Oculto (“Operation Hidden Carbon”) beginning in August 2025, considered the largest in Brazil’s history against organized crime. Instead of focusing on armed confrontation, this mega-operation targeted the faction’s financial heart, dismantling a billion-real scheme in the fuel and financial sectors. Public security experts were unanimous in their approval of the approach: attack the financial structure, not just its leaders or soldiers.
This is the necessary paradigm shift. The fight against the PCC will not be won with more police cars or revenge operations, but with integrated investigations that follow the flow of goods and money, expose money laundering, and identify the faction’s infiltration into strategic sectors of the economy and, increasingly, into politics.
The assassination of Fontes, with all the characteristics of a faction execution, was the materialization of the thesis that violence is the language of the PCC. The State needs to prove that its response can be more sophisticated, precise, and, ultimately, more effective, exchanging brute force for strategic intelligence—which includes effectively leveraging its financial intelligence (FININT) capabilities. Only by economically asphyxiating the organization and dismantling its corporate structure will it be possible to break the cycle of violence and deliver a definitive checkmate to the power that emanates from crime.
