Black people are 4 times more likely to be killed by police, study says
Black people have, on average, four times more risk of dying in police actions than white people in the nine states monitored by the Security Observatory Network.
The data is part of the study obtained by CNN Brasil "Target Skin: between racism and lethality, tomorrow", released this Wednesday (1st), which brings together information obtained through the Access to Information Law (LAI) from the Public Security secretariats of Amazonas, Bahia, Ceará, Maranhão, Pará, Pernambuco, Piauí, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo.
According to the survey, 4,330 deaths resulting from police intervention were recorded in 2025, an increase of 6.4% compared to the previous year. Considering only the cases in which there was information about race or color, 86.3% of the victims were black.
Young people up to 29 years old represented 64.8% of all deaths, equivalent to 2,804 victims. Within this group, 2,492 were between 18 and 29 years old. The survey also counted 312 children and adolescents up to 17 years old killed in police actions, two children up to 11 years old and another 310 victims between 12 and 17 years old.
"In data from 2025, we state: on average across states, black people are four times more likely to be killed by police than white people," says the study when analyzing rates per 100,000 inhabitants.
See the graph below:
State panorama
Inequality is even greater in some states. In Pernambuco, according to research, the risk for black people is 11 times higher than that of the white population. In Rio de Janeiro, the difference is six times.
The research also points out that four states recorded, in 2025, the highest number of deaths due to police intervention since the beginning of the historical series, in 2019. Ceará recorded 200 deaths, Maranhão 142, Pará 632 and São Paulo 834 victims. In Bahia, although there was a drop in relation to the record recorded in 2024, there were 1,570 deaths.
The data shows that we are not facing a fatality or isolated cases. Year after year, the main victims of police lethality continue to be black youth from the outskirts.
Silvia Ramos, social scientist and director of the Security Observatory Network
São Paulo recorded the highest number of victims in the historical series, even in a context of falling criminal indicators, such as theft and robbery. In 2024, 812 deaths were recorded. In 2025, there was an increase of 22 deaths compared to the previous year. The state accumulates 4,774 victims in seven years.
Maranhão, on the other hand, showed the most alarming growth, with an 86.8% increase in deaths in just one year. The numbers went from 76 deaths to 142 in 2025. In the northeastern state, the phenomenon is attributed to the internalization of criminal factions from the Southeast and the state response based on confrontation, according to the report.
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The numbers also show the situation in Pará, which reached a record of 632 deaths, an increase of 35 deaths compared to 2024. The state has accumulated 4,028 deaths in seven years. In Belém alone, there were 99 deaths, the highest absolute number among the municipalities in Pará.
In turn, Ceará recorded 200 deaths in 2025, the highest level since 2019. Only 12 municipalities accounted for 50.5% of the victims across the state. In seven years, lethality increased by 47.1%, totaling 1,094 deaths in the period.
Methodology
The seventh edition of the report "Target Skin: between racism and lethality, tomorrow" is based on the collection of official data from the public security departments of the nine monitored states (Amazonas, Bahia, Ceará, Maranhão, Pará, Pernambuco, Piauí, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo).
The information is obtained through requests via the Access to Information Law and undergoes validation and standardization by the Observatory Network; Monitoring maintains comparability with data collected since 2019.
Source: CNN