Guardiões do Estado

The Guardians of the State (Brazilian Portuguese: Guardiões do Estado), or the acronym GDE, is a Brazilian criminal faction. It operates in the state of Ceará.

Guardians of the State

Guardiões do Estado
Marking the territory of the criminal faction
Territory	Ceará, Brazil
Ethnicity	Brazilians
Activities	Murder, drug trafficking, extortion, assault and rebellion
Allies	Terceiro Comando Puro,[1] Primeiro Comando da Capital[2]
Rivals	Comando Vermelho, Família do Norte[3]

It is the 4th largest faction in Brazil and is made up mostly of poorly prepared teenagers,^[4] pre-teens and young adults.^[5] One of the main reasons would be the lack of monthly fees.^{[clarification needed][6]}

The place or date of origin of the faction is not known for sure, as some sources claim that the faction emerged in mid-2012, others claim that it emerged in 2006,^[7] 2015, 2014 or 2016,^[8][9][10] but the most accepted is that it appeared in 2017, in the community of Conjunto Palmeiras.^[11][12]

Faction power is decentralized, so there is no overall faction leader. Currently, it is known for burning buses, massacres and homicides in the state,^[13] the most notable being the Cajazeiras massacre.^[14][15]

See also

• Primeiro Comando da Capital
• Comando Vermelho
• List of criminal gangs in Brazil
• Cajazeiras massacre [pt]
• Attacks in Ceará in 2019 [pt]