Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani is going to help Rio de Janeiro fight crime before it hosts the 2016 Olympics.
During a visit to a Rio slum on Thursday, Giuliani said his consulting firm will be paid to offer advice on how to improve safety in the crime-plagued city.
Per the AP:
Rio Governor Sergio Cabral says that Giuliani's consulting firm will be contracted to give security advice, though details of the deal were not disclosed.
Though Giuliani is legendary for running New York City while the city experienced a dramatic drop in crime -- which many credit to his tough zero-tolerance stance -- he hasn't been as successful in getting the same results in other cities.
When Giuliani and his consulting firm were hired by Mexico City in 2003 to help the crime-ridden capital improve security, the headlines blared: "Giuliani to the rescue" and he was mobbed and cheered as his motorcade toured one of the city's danger zones.
But two years later, as the New York Sun reported, the cheering stopped:
In January 2005, Mexico City's new police chief, Joel Ortega, told local reporters, "I am no fan of Giuliani." Far from the 67% drop in homicides achieved during Mr. Giuliani's mayoralty in New York, which was touted in a Giuliani Partners press release announcing its Mexico City contract, the homicide rate in Mexico's capital slipped less than 1% in 2004. Kidnappings in which the victim is driven from ATM to ATM to withdraw money are on the rise, with some security firms saying Mexico is now rivaling Colombia as kidnapping capital of the world...
"The Giuliani plan did not have any effect. It was money in the trash, really," said a police officer patrolling the central square here earlier this month, Nicocio Acosto Leon. "Better to buy arms, uniforms, to fix our vehicles because we have to do that ourselves."
Though Giuliani aides defended their work in Mexico City, they ended up being paid less than the $4.3 million price they were due and were not hired for a follow-up project to put their recommendations into place.