Terceiro Comando (Portuguese for ''Third Command'') was a Brazilian

criminal organization In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definitions of", in Can ...

engaged in drug trafficking in

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro, or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of Rio de Janeiro. It is the List of cities in Brazil by population, second-most-populous city in Brazil (after São Paulo) and the Largest cities in the America ...

. It was founded in the early 1980s and is a break-away faction of the

Comando Vermelho Comando Vermelho (, ''Red Command'' or ''Red Commando''), also known as CV, is a Brazilian criminal organization engaged primarily in drug trafficking, arms trafficking, protection racketeering, kidnapping-for-ransom, hijacking of armored tru ...

. The ''Terceiro Comando'' has fought several small-scale conflicts (in 2001 and 2004) with the rival gang

. The organization has no sole leader and is instead a horizontal reciprocity based network that helps member-gangs in different

favelas Favela () is an hyponymy and hypernymy, umbrella name for several types of impoverished neighborhoods in Brazil. The term, which means slum or ghetto, was first used in the Morro da Providência, Slum of Providência in the center of Rio de J ...

as they attempt to acquire drugs and guns.

References

Organized crime groups in Brazil 1980s establishments in Brazil Terrorism in Brazil {{Crime-org-stub