Para além do trágico desfecho

uma história vista de baixo da “Operação mata-mendigos”

Abstract

The “Operation killer of beggars” was a series of crimes against homeless people perpetrated by agents of the Service for the Repression of Begging in the extinct state of Guanabara, in the early 1960s. The case is usually approached from the perspective of political disputes between Carlos Lacerda, governor of the state, and the newspaper Ultima Hora, pioneer in denouncing the crimes. Aiming for a history from below and the exercise of historical empathy, this work brings the stories of four individuals directly involved in the episode, two victims and two perpetrators / prosecuted. The intertwining of these individual stories highlight: a territorially unequal distribution of real or perceived life opportunities; an authoritarian police tradition; different political agencies; and a gradient of greater punishability for lower hierarchical strata of the state apparatus.