Franco, a lesbian activist who grew up in a favela and became an outspoken critic of Rio’s powerful militia groups, was 38 when she was gunned down in the city center alongside her driver, Anderson Gomes, News.Az reports, citing foreign media.
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The case sent shockwaves through Brazil and drew international condemnation.
The four-justice Supreme Court bench voted unanimously to convict former federal lawmaker Chiquinho Brazao, 62, and his brother Domingos, 60, a former state lawmaker, of ordering the hit on Franco.
They were each sentenced to 76 years and three months in jail for double aggravated homicide, armed criminal organization, and the attempted murder of one of Franco’s advisors who survived the attack.
The court found that Franco had been targeted as she was a threat to the interests of the Brazao brothers.
From her position on the city council, Franco worked to prevent the expansion of clandestine housing developments in poor neighborhoods, one of the militias’ biggest sources of income.
The Brazao brothers “didn’t just have contact with the militia. They were the militia,” Judge Alexandre de Moraes said in court.
Franco was murdered to deliver a “message” to Rio’s political class, the court heard.
She was, said Moraes, “a black woman who dared to go against the interests of militia members, men, and white people.”
Rio’s militias emerged around four decades ago when former police officers and security agents created so-called self-defense groups to protect communities from drug gangs.
They quickly evolved into powerful criminal organizations — controlling large parts of the city, extorting residents and seizing public land — while benefiting from high-level political support.
