Marco Aurélio case: family fights for justice after execution by a military police officer
Family decries the execution of a young man by a military police officer and resorts to the UN in reaction to the impunity in the case
Marco Aurélio Cardenas Acosta, morto pela polícia em SP. Foto: Arquivo pessoal
Even with the footage showing a military police officer chasing and executing Marco Aurélio Cardenas Acosta, age 22, with a point-black shot in July 2023, the Court of Justice of São Paulo (TJSP, acronym in Portuguese) once again denied the request for a pre-trial arrest of the police officer this month. The decision is a demonstration of the lack of accountability for the lethal actions of the São Paulo state police and reinforces the weight of complaints of the dismantling of control mechanisms and the escalation of police lethality in the state.
In 2023, São Paulo reported 504 deaths by police intervention — a figure that then increased to 813 in 2024, according to the 2025 Public Security Map, prepared by the Ministry of Justice. The increase particularly affects children, adolescents, and the Black population. Between 2022, deaths of youth in police raids increased by 120%. Black people continue to be the main victims: they are 3.7 times more affected by brutal interventions of the military police, according to a report by UNICEF and the Brazilian Public Security Forum published this month.
Marco Aurélio was a university student living with his parents in Vila Mariana, a middle-class neighborhood in the south side of the capital city. According to the police officers involved, he would have resisted the approach and attempted to disarm an officer. Footage from the security cameras, however, contradict this official version: they show the young man, unarmed and being cornered and murdered without the chance to even react.
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“My son was chosen due to social discrimination and because he looked like a poor person, even though he lived in a middle-class neighborhood”, claimed Julio Cesar Acosta Navarro, father of the student, during the 59th Session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, in a parallel event promoted to denounce the escalation of police violence in São Paulo and other regions of Brazil. The summit took place in June and gathered, in addition to the parents of the victim, Gina Romero, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights to Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and of Association; Morris Tidball-Binz, UN Special Rapporteur on summary or arbitrary executions; Thiago Amparo, lawyer and professor of international law and human rights at FGV, and Camila Asano, Executive Director of Conectas.
“This is a case of xenophobia, racism, and violence against people who look poor”, highlighted Julio Cesar Acosta Navarro.
Marco Aurélio’s mother, Silvia Mônica Cardenas Prado, an intensive care physician, also held the State directly accountable: “My greatest source of pride is not being a cardiologist – what makes me proudest is being a mother. And the São Paulo State government murdered my son, Marco Aurélio.”
In spite of his brutal actions, the military police officer is still free, transferred to administrative work, but with access to weapons. The victim’s family now intends to resort to the Superior Court of Justice (STJ), claiming that he is a risk to public order.
Deaths following a pattern: downward shots, lack of forensic investigation and no accountability
The execution of Marco Aurélio is not an isolated case. Data from the report entitled Mapas da Injustiça (Injustice Maps, in a free translation), coordinated by lawyer and professor Thiago Amparo, show an alarming pattern of impunity. The study analyzed 859 police investigation reports on raids that resulted in the death of 946 people in São Paulo. No officers had charges brought against them by the Prosecution Office. Among the cases with forensic analysis:
- 30% included downward shots, which could indicate that the victims had surrendered or were in a submissive stance;
- Only 8.9% had a report on the scene of the crime;
- For 85% of the deaths, the victims’ hands were not tested for gunpowder residue.
“The lack of transparency and the sluggishness in obtaining information — it took two years to even access the investigation reports — show the institutional erasure of State violence”, stated Amparo at the same event in Geneva.
International calls for justice
In June, during a session of the UN Human Rights Council, in Geneva, Marco Aurélio’s parents, specialists and Brazilian organizations denounced the escalation of police lethality in Brazil. In an urgent appeal to the United Nations, the victim’s family asked that the state government be held accountable for the death of their son and that the Brazilian State be held accountable for human rights violations resulting from police violence occurring throughout the country.
Camila Asano, the executive director at Conectas, made an appeal during the parallel event for the pressuring of the Brazilian government into holding officers involved in executions accountable and into implementing concrete measures to prevent abuse. The activity also welcomed UN Rapporteur for Summary and Arbitrary Executions, Morris Tidball-Binz, and the Rapporteur on Freedom of Association, Gina Romero, stating their concern with the case.
State-perpetrated and selective violence
The international notoriety of the Marco Aurélio case reinforces the warning: police violence in Brazil is selective, concentrated in outskirts with higher Black population and supported by the omission of the justice system. The permanence of police officers involved in executions within the corporation, even in the face of solid evidence, is part of a scheme that normalizes the excessive use of force. The struggle of victims’ families for justice sheds light not only on their pain, but also on the urgency of structural reforms. As stated by the mother of the murdered youth: “What happened to my son could happen to anyone.”
