Rio de Janeiro's vast Sambadrome Carnival cheer masks dark world

In the flurry of blue and white that lit up Rio de Janeiro's vast Sambadrome last week, black bands could be spotted on the wrists of some who marched to the driving beats.
It was a sombre touch for the prestigious Beija-Flor samba school, 12 times winner of the city's carnival parade. The black bands worn at a rehearsal for the carnival, which begins next weekend, were a tribute to a murdered dancer.

 Rio revellers dance in street parties as the carnival approaches. Photo / AP
The tortured corpse of Claudio da Silva, 25, a transvestite who lived as a woman, was discovered on January 24.

A Brazilian man welds a sculpture for the carnival parade at the Mangueira Samba school in Rio de Janeiro.

It was a murder that highlighted Brazil's homophobia and transphobia problem, and the criminal underworld that lurks behind the happy-go-lucky carnival facade.
The alarm had first been raised the week before, when Da Silva failed to turn up for a rehearsal at the samba school's quadra, or main hall - she never missed a practice, so her relatives and friends became concerned.

The next day a shocking video surfaced on social media, purporting to show her being tortured to death in a nearby favela.
The footage showed Da Silva pleading with unseen aggressors while they grilled her about what she was doing there. Her face and body were already covered in blood.
Frantic relatives searched the area after the video was released and found her body, disfigured and riddled with bullets. There has since been wild speculation about what caused her tragic death.
The most obvious motive appeared to be transphobia. The world of carnival is defined by its high camp, and in recent years a gay soap actor had appeared on a strawberry-scented float to rapturous applause. Men dressed as women fill the streets of Rio as part of the celebrations.
Homophobia is also entrenched in Brazil, with one gay person killed on average every 28 hours. Some of the online comments condemned the wristband homage and used derogatory homophobic slang such as bicho (animal) to describe Da Silva.
On January 30, six days after Da Silva's body was found, a National Trans Visibility day was held in Brazil, with transvestites and transsexuals descending on Rio's City Hall to raise awareness of violence and prejudice against trans people. Beatriz Cordeiro, 28, from Projeto Damas, which works to get trans people into employment, said: "Foreigners come to carnival expecting free sex and love, but the image Brazil exports of freedom and liberty is false. There is a lot of prejudice in society still."
Murders of transsexuals and transvestites are common, with 312 trans, gay or bisexual people murdered in 2013, according to a report by Grupo Gay da Bahia, Brazil's most established gay rights groups.
There were clues that other motives could also have contributed to Da Silva's murder - ones related to the organised crime pervasive in places like Morro de Mina where she died. One indication was the wall of silence that greeted her death from many quarters.
"People are afraid to talk. You never know who is listening or watching, and they don't want to get involved," one anonymous member of Beija-Flor said, in reference to the climate of fear surrounding the dancer's murder.
The samba school would not respond to media requests, and many members refused to even confirm that they knew Da Silva, despite her attendance record and reputation as one of the most lively members of the Beija-Flor school.
The area of Nilopolis in Rio's northern suburbs, far from its beaches and tourist attractions, is not only home to the Beija-Flor school with its illustrious place in samba history, founded in 1948; it is also covered by a patchwork of favelas dominated by frequently warring drug gangs, including the notorious Comando Vermelho (Red Command), the gang that has control of Morro da Mina. On the Facebook community page for Nilopolis, some residents describe the favela as a "hell" where violence rules.
More than 900,000 tourists are expected in Rio this year for the official parade. The Beija-Flor school has planned a sumptuous parade, with the theme of Equatorial Guinea, in a nod to the African roots of the samba sound and the people living in the poorer communities where it thrives.