By Isabela Fraga
Owner and editor in chief of the Brazilian news website Última Hora News, Eduardo Carvalho, was shot to death on the evening of Wednesday, Nov. 21, in the city of Campo Grande, Mato Grosso do Sul, reported the website G1.
A retired police officer, the journalist frequently published news about crime and had been threatened several times, as well as sued for slander and defamation, according to the website Terra. Carvalho shot three times by two gunmen when he arrived at his home with his wife on a motorcycle, reported the newspaper Estado de São Paulo.
According to Última Hora News, the journalist's wife tried to fire back at their attackers with Carvalho's gun but there was no ammunition in it. The case was directed to the homicide division and is under investigation.
"The period since President Dilma Rousseff took office has been the deadliest two years for the Brazilian press since CPJ began documenting cases in 1992," said Carlos Lauría, Committee to Protect Journalists’ senior program coordinator for the Americas. "Authorities must take action now to guarantee that journalists can report without fear of reprisal, by bringing journalists' murderers to justice and breaking the deadly cycle of impunity."
Carvalho is the third journalist killed in the state of Mato Grosso in 2012, out of the six press workers killed in Brazil so far this year. The other two killed journalists in the state this year are Luiz Henrique Georges and Paulo Roberto Cardoso Rodrigues, both killed in the city of Ponta Porã, along the Brazil-Paraguay border. The area is considered dangerous for journalists. "It's a lawless zone and an important transportation point for contraband weapons and drugs," according to a special report from the International Press Institute released in March 2012.
Note from the editor: This story was originally published by the Knight Center’s blog Journalism in the Americas, the predecessor of LatAm Journalism Review.
