SantaBandita
08-12-2009, 05:05 PM
Brazil TV host accused of ordering killings to boost ratings
"Police charge that the host of a Brazilian TV crime show was involved in organized drug trafficking and ordered killings to get rid of rivals and boost his ratings, the BBC reports.
Wallace Souza, a former police officer who is now a state legislator, says the charges are merely an attempt by rivals to smear him.
"I was the one who organized legislative inquiries into organized crime, the prison system, corruption, drug trafficking by police, and pedophilia," Souza tells the Associated Press.
But the police say he ordered killings in the state of Amazonas and alerted TV crews to get them to the scene first.
His popular TV show, Canal Livre, was suspended last year as police stepped up their investigation. It featured Souza, in a studio, railing against rampant crime in the state, punctuated with often exclusive footage of arrests, crime scenes and drug seizures.
"We believe that they organized a kind of death squad to execute rivals who disputed with them the drug trafficking business," state police intelligence chief Thomaz Vasconcelos tells the AP. Souza, he charged, "would eliminate his rival and use the killing as a news story for his program."
The authorities accuse him of ordering at least five murders."
....
http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2009/08/brazil-tv-host-accused-of-ordering-killings-to-boost-ratings.html
Sadly I think the accusations could be true.
"Police charge that the host of a Brazilian TV crime show was involved in organized drug trafficking and ordered killings to get rid of rivals and boost his ratings, the BBC reports.
Wallace Souza, a former police officer who is now a state legislator, says the charges are merely an attempt by rivals to smear him.
"I was the one who organized legislative inquiries into organized crime, the prison system, corruption, drug trafficking by police, and pedophilia," Souza tells the Associated Press.
But the police say he ordered killings in the state of Amazonas and alerted TV crews to get them to the scene first.
His popular TV show, Canal Livre, was suspended last year as police stepped up their investigation. It featured Souza, in a studio, railing against rampant crime in the state, punctuated with often exclusive footage of arrests, crime scenes and drug seizures.
"We believe that they organized a kind of death squad to execute rivals who disputed with them the drug trafficking business," state police intelligence chief Thomaz Vasconcelos tells the AP. Souza, he charged, "would eliminate his rival and use the killing as a news story for his program."
The authorities accuse him of ordering at least five murders."
....
http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2009/08/brazil-tv-host-accused-of-ordering-killings-to-boost-ratings.html
Sadly I think the accusations could be true.