Robin Hood in Matto Grosso

The State of Matto Grosso is the Wild West of Brazil. Its bad men use Tommy guns instead of six-shooters. Just now the scourge of the Matto Grosso cattle country, north of Paraguay, is a band of Tommy gunners led by three brothers, Cardoso, Rolin and Joao Batista.

They are polished, polite, of good Matto Grosso family. In the finest badman tradition, they affirm that their motive is not mere greed; they rob and kill to avenge a murdered brother and to buy a ranch for their father, who has been exiled to the State of Parana. Their mother still lives in the town of Campo Grande, and she is said to regret that she is too old to produce more Tommy-gunning sons.

With 15 Tommy gunners in their train, the brothers Batista in the last three months have terrorized a 1,000-mile strip of Matto Grosso and Goiaz. Ranchers have fled into the cities. Local authorities are helpless; 140 men from the State of Sao Paulo accomplished nothing. Last week a delegate from the ranchers arrived at Rio de Janeiro to beg President Getulio Vargas for Federal troops. The ranchers could not defend their homes themselves; President Vargas' untrusting Government had taken their rifles away.

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