Sao Goncalo, Brazil — Just before leaving her teaching job on the afternoon of May 17, Alessandra Mattos received a panicked voice message. “Alessandra!” a relative said. “There’s been an accident with Brayan.”

She grabbed her things, flagged a motorcycle taxi and rushed to a slum in the Rio de Janeiro suburb of Sao Goncalo. There, dead in a pool of blood, lay Brayan Mattos dos Santos, the 19-year-old nephew she helped raise. She tried to get closer, but a policeman blocked her advance...

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