AMERICAN MISSIONARY SHOT TO DEATH IN BRAZIL, 2 SUSPECTS ARRESTED
www.hcjb.org
February 15, 2005

An American missionary was shot to death in the Amazon state of Para on
Saturday, Feb. 12, less than a week after she accused loggers and
ranchers of threatening to kill rural workers, authorities said. Dorothy
Stang, 74, was accompanying a group of peasants to a meeting with other
local workers when they were attacked near the jungle town of Anapu,
about 1,300 miles north of São Paulo. She was shot three times in the
face, said federal police officer Fernando Raiol. Two suspects had
already been taken into custody, police said. Stang, of Dayton, Ohio, had
lived in Brazil since the early 1960s and worked in the Amazon region for
more than 20 years. She was an outspoken critic of efforts by loggers and
large landowners to expropriate lands and clear large areas of the Amazon rainforest.
Last year, Stang, who was a naturalized Brazilian, was accused by the loggers
of inciting violence in the region and supplying weapons and ammunition to
the local people, a claim strongly denied by her family.The early-morning attack came
less than a week after she met with Human Rights Secretary
Nilmario Miranda to report that four local farmers had received death
threats. "This is extremely serious," Miranda told reporters on Saturday.
"We cannot allow this murder to go unpunished." Brazilian President Luiz
Inacio Lula da Silva ordered federal police to conduct a thorough
investigation into Stang's murder. (WorldWide Religious News/Associated
Press)