Lady Gaga’s 2.5 million-strong Rio concert targeted for bomb attack by hate group posing as her ‘Little Monsters’ fans, Brazilian police say
Lady Gaga’s record-breaking concert in Rio de Janeiro on Saturday was targeted with a bomb plot by a hate group posing as “Little Monsters” fans, who planned to attack with IEDs and Molotov cocktails, Brazilian police revealed.
The plotters were organizing coordinated bombings and trying to recruit young Brazilians to carry out carnage at the event, which drew 2.5 million people to the world-famous Copacabana Beach, police in Rio said in a statement.
The recruiters falsely identified themselves as members of Gaga’s global fan base, known as “Little Monsters,” as a way to lure fans into “networks with violent and self-destructive content,” the Brazilian Justice Ministry said.
Rio state police intelligence uncovered digital networks that encouraged violent behavior and used coded language and extremist symbols to communicate their vile message, authorities said.
The plotters aimed to radicalize teenagers and promoted self-harm, violent content and hate speech, including against the LGBT community, the Civil Police of Rio de Janeiro state said.
They planned to use the bombing to gain notoriety on social networks, authorities said.
A man described as the leader of the group was arrested in the southern Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul for illegal possession of a firearm, while a teenager in Rio was arrested on child pornography charges, police said.
Over a dozen search and seizure warrants were carried out in the Brazilian states of Rio de Janeiro, Mato Grosso, Rio Grande do Sul and São Paulo, authorities said.
The raids were carried out quietly just hours before Gaga’s performance so as to avoid “panic or distortion of information,” police said.
There was no impact on those attending the free concert, the Justice Ministry said.Gaga only learned about the bomb plot after she read about it in the press, per reps told .
That means the “Born This Way” singer had no chance to decide whether to cancel the concert due to the threat.
Gaga’s free performance as part of her “Mayhem” tour was the biggest audience for a solo female artist in history, beating the record previously held by Madonna, who drew a crowd of 1.6 million.
“It’s a great honor to be asked to sing for Rio — for my whole career the fans in Brazil have been part of the lifeblood of the Little Monsters,” she wrote in an Instagram post announcing the show last month.
Saturday’s show was her first in Brazil in 12 years after she was forced to cancel a show in Rio years prior due to an injury.
