Gunman kills 11 and himself in Brazil New Year’s party rampage

A gunman stormed a house party and killed 11 people, including his former wife and eight-year-old son, before shooting himself in the head during a New Year’s Eve party in the southeastern Brazilian city of Campinas late on Saturday.

Police in the state of São Paulo said the shooter, identified as 46-year-old Sidnei Ramis de Araújo, is believed to have been angry over a split with his wife Isamara Filier (41) and their son João Victor.

Three other people remained hospitalised, police said, while four people survived the attack unharmed, including one partygoer who managed to flee to a bathroom and phone the police when the shooting began.

Survivors, according to a police spokesman, said that just before midnight, the gunman jumped over a fence surrounding the house, burst through a door and began firing even as he berated Filier for taking their son.

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Araújo possibly sought to take advantage of the commotion of New Year’s Eve to disguise the shooting, police said.

One neighbour told local television that he and his family heard shots, but had thought they might be fireworks until one of the wounded ran to their property, bleeding and pleading for help.

Mass shootings

Despite high rates of crime and violence in Brazil, including significant problems with assaults against women, the attack alarmed Latin America’s biggest country on a holiday associated with family gatherings.

Gun deaths are common in heists, hold-ups and confrontations among police, drug gangs and other criminals in Brazil, but targeted mass shootings are rare.

Police said Araújo, reported by local media to be a laboratory technician, used a 9mm pistol and carried two additional clips, extra ammunition, a knife and unspecified but unused explosives.

Investigators are analysing the explosives in addition to a phone and audio recorder found in a car he parked outside the home to determine whether Araújo left any sort of message about the attack.

Police said they did not yet know if Araújo had a history of violence or whether he had been known to physically harm or threaten his former wife before the attack.

Campinas, an industrial and university city of more than million residents, is about 100km northwest of the city of São Paulo, Brazil’s biggest metropolis.

– Reuters