Sao Paulo violence kills 7

In and around Brazil's crime-ridden largest city Sao Paulo, seven people, including an infant, were killed late Thursday and another six were injured, local media reported Friday. In a new wave of violence that authorities attribute to a criminal gang known as the First Command of the Capital (or by its Portuguese acronym PCC) which operates from the country's prisons, a mother and her infant son were gunned down by unknown assailants in the district of Sao Bernardo do Campo. The boy died from a bullet wound to the neck and the mother has been hospitalized, healthcare workers said. The other six victims died in separate incidents in the area of Guarulhos, on the outskirts of Sao Paulo, and in the city's districts of Guaianazes, Jardim Tiete and Tatuape, authorities said. In the last 45 days, the number of homicides has shot to more than 250 in Sao Paulo and the metropolitan area, where the PCC was said to be lashing out against police crackdowns. More than 90 police officers have been killed in the region so far this year, many while off duty. Brazilian media published Friday the testimony of a suspect arrested for killing a police officer in the state of Sao Paulo, who said he was ordered by the PCC, to whom he owned "debts" for drugs they supplied him when he was serving time in prison. Spiraling violence in Sao Paulo has spilled over to the southern state of Santa Catarina, where there have been more than 40 attacks against police stations and buses since Monday, leading to three deaths and 46 arrests.