Brazilian Police Chief Clayton Leao Chaves Shot to Death During Live Radio Interview

(May 27) -- A police chief in northeast Brazil was shot to death in his car as he was giving an interview on his mobile phone to a radio show about the fight against drug traffickers. His anguished wife cried on the air: "Oh my God in heaven! Oh my God in heaven! For the love of God!"

Clayton Leao Chaves, police chief in Camacari, was just finishing his interview with journalists on Bahia state's Lider FM station when the hosts and thousands of listeners heard the sound of gunshots and his wife's cries, The Guardian reported.

"He was talking," his wife screamed hysterically. "He was giving an interview on the radio."

"I heard some bangs," one of the show's two hosts said as the police chief abruptly stopped talking.

"Something serious has happened to our chief! It can't be anything else," he said. "The chief was just talking to us. We don't know what has happened. There is a lady weeping."

The hosts then made a plea on the air for police to get to the scene. The station kept rolling on the audio emanating from Chaves' mobile phone until a bystander appeared to arrive on the scene to help and the line went dead.

"Attention military police, attention colleagues of the police chief," said host Raimundo Rui. "Get to the Cascalheira Highway urgently! Something serious has just happened!"

The clip below, from a Portuguese-language news broadcast, has audio from the phone call:

Chaves was on his way to begin work at police headquarters when he and his wife were ambushed in their car after Chaves pulled over to do the interview on his cellphone.

Two gunmen had apparently followed Chaves in a white Volkswagen and then fled after shooting him.

Chaves had been giving an interview about how police in the area were struggling to make the region more safe despite increased drug trafficking.

The more than 230,000 residents of Camacari, like other areas of Brazil, have been under siege from drug-related violence, especially involving crack cocaine.

In a statement, the radio station said: "Lider FM talks every day about what is happening in the city. Unfortunately we have now reached the point where the city's police chief himself has been assassinated."

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