Brazilian police kill knife-wielding suspect who held 13 children hostage in Curitiba
Police in Curitiba killed a man who had held at least 13 children at knifepoint for about two hours in a childcare centre in southern Brazil. None of the children were injured, according to AP and SIC Notícias.
The hostage situation
Police in Curitiba, the capital of Parana state in southern Brazil, killed a man who had held children hostage at an early-childhood centre in the São Braz neighbourhood. AP reports that he broke into one of the classrooms and kept children and staff as hostages for two hours. Curitiba has 1.8 million residents and lies 400 kilometers (248 miles) south of São Paulo, and the centre sits in what AP describes as a middle-class part of the city. Reports differ on the day: AP says the suspect was killed on Thursday, while SIC Notícias and SAPO say the incident happened on Friday afternoon. AP reports at least 13 children were held, and SIC Notícias says none of the children were injured.
Negotiations and the killing
SAPO reports that the state Secretariat of Public Security (SESP) made first contact with the suspect at about 17:30 local time, and that the area was cordoned off as a police helicopter and the Special Operations Police Battalion (BOPE) were deployed. Captain João Roberto Galeto told local media that the armed man, who had a knife, was locked inside a room with the 13 children, according to 20 minutos. Police spokeswoman Leticia Martins said the suspect threatened to pour gasoline onto himself and others, and she did not say whether he had given a specific reason for his actions. SIC Notícias, citing G1, reports that police killed the suspect at about 18:20 local time, after more than two hours of attempted negotiations. Martins did not disclose how the suspect was killed, but she explained the outcome in these words:
our negotiating teams were in place, but saw no alternative but to neutralize him
Children, families and the wider context
AP reports that minutes after two explosions, policemen emerged carrying some of the children, while tearful parents waited outside for information. SIC Notícias, citing local authorities quoted by G1, says the children were between two and four years old, while AP says the police did not disclose their ages. Curitiba city hall said in a statement that the children and staff will receive psychological support, and SAPO reports that the municipal education secretariat said families were being received by city teams and psychology professionals. The city hall also thanked the authorities for their work, according to SIC Notícias. SIC Notícias reports that a school next to the centre was evacuated and parents were called to collect their children, and that the reasons for the intrusion and any link between the suspect and the children were not yet known. Parana has seen violence in schools before: in 2023 a man with a pistol entered a school in Cambé and killed two students during the shootout that followed, according to SIC Notícias.
