Luiz Alberto Araújo, the secretary for the environment on the city council, arrived home with his family. Before he could get out of his car, two men on a motorcycle pulled up and the passenger shot seven bullets into the 54-year-old. The killer got off the bike, opened the car door and shot him twice more. No attempt was made to steal anything. The killing had all the hallmarks of the sort of assassination that is common in the lawless Pará state, where illegal logging, clandestine mining and modern slavery are rife. Araújo was a government official, so advocates say his murder is a rare and worrying development: “It sends a message that no one is untouchable”. His work was a cross-section of the region’s environmental woes, from the battle against deforestation to the consequences of the Belo Monte dam. Araújo had become used to receiving death threats.