The most known case of an attach to a cruiser in Brazil was the one that caused the death of Peter Blake. A few remarks must be made about that case:
Peter was at a remote location inside the Amazon River, without any type of security other then his own gun. He was attacked by some local opportunists armed of a hand gun. Peter went inside and brought back a rifle, but did not shoot at the bandit with the hand gun, which in turn, shot at Peter. This is not piracy, it is one attach of a couple of burglars that unfortunatelly ended into Peter´s death. The attackers were identified and jailed.
Like in Peter´s case, more recently there was another case that ended in the death of a well known Brazilian cruiser in Itaparica, close to Salvador. Also not an act of organized pirates, but another couple of opportunists that went to rob whatever they could hand carry from the boat, and when the cruiser wok up with the noise and came running into the cock-pit, he was shot. These bandits were cought and jailed. Case closed.
Early in 2012, there were a few cases of boats savagely attacked in the areas of Ubatuba, Parati, Angra dos Reis and Rio de Janeiro. It started with a very brutal attack on a 64f yacht from São Paulo, that was spending a few days in Angra dos Reis, and then continued to a few more boats in the regions mentioned above. One of the attackers was finally identified as an ex-crew of the yacht and that led to the jailing of all members of that group. Case closed and also not a case of organized piracy.
When sailing in Brazil or, for that reason, anywhere, you need to consider the areas that you anchor, avoiding areas that are too far from civilization, staying only on areas recommended on the guide that will be made available to all members of the BRally. In addition, always be in a group of boats, never anchoring alone. That is a good practice in any place around the world, and not particular to Brazil.
With 190M people, having less then a hand full of cases of attacks to boats in Brazil, one can hardly call that piracy.
