4th Auxiliary Police Bureau

News about the seizure of counterfeit banknotes by major Carlos Reis, 4th auxiliary police chief, in June 1924

The 4th Auxiliary Police Bureau of the Civil Police of the Federal District was a Brazilian political and investigative police division that operated in Rio de Janeiro from 1922 to 1933. It was based in the Central Police Building, under the jurisdiction of the Chief of Police of the Federal District and the Ministry of Justice, while being politically directed by the Military Cabinet of the Presidency. Although its jurisdiction was limited to the Federal District, its investigators could operate in other states and even abroad. Succeeding the Inspectorate of Investigation and Public Security (1920) and preceding the Special Delegation of Political and Social Security (DESPS) (1933), the 4th Police Bureau was a precursor to Rio de Janeiro's DOPS and served as a model for similar organizations in other states.

The division had a specialized police force, distinguishing it from other auxiliary and neighborhood bureaus. Three of its sections — Social Order and Public Security, Political Security, and Supervision of Explosives, Weapons, and Ammunition — carried out political police functions, although political surveillance was not its sole mission. While monitoring political groups was not new to the police, its institutionalization was relatively recent. The bureau's primary activity was intelligence gathering through infiltrated agents, informants, wiretaps, and surveillance of suspects in public spaces, workplaces, and homes. This resulted in a large volume of reports and statistics, systematically shared with other state agencies. Its agents also conducted arrests, and its facilities held detainees before their transfer to prisons, from where they could be exiled from the capital.

The immediate reason for its creation was the rise of the tenentist movement, which necessitated an entity to protect the First Brazilian Republic's government from a series of military conspiracies. Thanks to the political police, many conspiracies were dismantled before escalating into revolts. Similar police reorganizations were occurring in other countries in response to the revolutions of 1917–1923. The 4th Bureau's agents targeted military personnel, members of the political elite, anarchists, communists, and common criminals. During most of the long state of emergency under president Artur Bernardes (1922–1926), its head was major Carlos Reis, under whom the prisons became overcrowded, and the police were accused of torture and even killing detainees, notably in the Conrado Niemeyer case. Before and during the Constitutionalist Revolution of 1932, the 4th Bureau pursued conspirators and propagandists opposed to Getúlio Vargas' government.

Creation

President Artur Bernardes signed a decree reorganizing the Civil Police of the Federal District on 20 November 1922, five days after taking office. Among other measures, the decree abolished the requirement that the Chief of Police could only be a law graduate, subordinated the Identification and Statistics Offices, Legal Medical Services, and Investigations and Captures divisions to the Ministry of Justice and Interior Affairs, proposed the creation of a Civil Police Academy, and transformed the Inspectorate of Investigation and Public Security into the 4th Auxiliary Police Bureau.

The Inspectorate of Investigation and Public Security, established in 1920 during the administration of Epitácio Pessoa, was the first police body officially created to preserve the political regime. Its primary section was Social Order and Public Security, which reported directly to the inspector, unlike other sections that were under three sub-inspectors. This section already existed within the predecessor organization to the Inspectorate, the Investigation and Public Security Corps. While providing intelligence on political opponents to the government is an old police function, it took time to be formally institutionalized in Brazil. The term "political police" first appeared in Brazilian legislation in 1900 as a responsibility of the Chief of Police, without the establishment of a dedicated organization for this purpose.

Initially small, with one commissioner and seven agents in 1917, the Social Order and Public Security Section continuously grew in importance. Anarcho-syndicalist agitation among workers was reaching its peak during the strikes of 1917–1919, and political police activities first developed to monitor this environment and later expanded to include elite opposition figures. Abroad, major European countries were organizing political police forces in response to the revolutions of 1917–1923. The reorganization of state security was an international trend, materialized in conferences and international police agreements. On 29 February 1920, two days after the regulations for the Inspectorate were published in the Official Gazette, Brazil signed a treaty with Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay, and Peru under the auspices of the League of Nations for the exchange of information on "anarchic acts". Later, in 1926, the 4th Auxiliary Police Chief traveled to Switzerland, Germany, France, and other European countries on a mission from the Ministry of Justice, observing local police measures against communism.

The reorganization of the police responded to two demands: modernizing the institution and protecting those in power. It reflected a trend toward specialization, which led to the growth of the Central Police Sections at the expense of neighborhood bureaus. Politically, military revolts motivated the institutionalization of the political police. The first of these, the Copacabana Fort revolt on 5 July 1922, attempted to prevent Bernardes' inauguration. Although suppressed, it marked the beginning of a military movement against the regime, known as tenentism. While anarchists organized strikes and planted bombs, the tenentists wielded heavy weaponry. That same year also saw the emergence of another group opposing the regime, the Communist Party. The funding for the establishment of the bureau was included in the 1923 budget of the Ministry of Justice. According to the law, the 4th Bureau would receive the "necessary credit," unlike most government agencies, which faced fixed allocations due to the economic crisis.

The 4th Auxiliary Police Bureau served as a model for similar organizations in the states. In 1924, São Paulo established the Department of Political and Social Order, whose acronym — DOPS — would become emblematic of these institutions. In 1927, Minas Gerais created the Civil Police Investigations Service, which included the Department of Personal Security and Political and Social Order, with responsibilities very similar to those of the 4th Auxiliary Police Bureau. However, the federal government, which had created the 4th Bureau in the Federal District, did not play an active role in structuring state-level agencies.

References

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