The perpetrator was masked and wore camouflage clothing. He was driving a car with the number plates covered up.
Armed with a gun, the man went to a public school where he started shooting. Two teachers lost their lives. He then drove to a private school where he killed another person with his firearm. It is not yet known whether it concerns a student or an employee of the school.
Images are doing the rounds on Twitter of the man running armed towards one of the schools.
Eleven people were also injured, authorities said. The shooter fled after the facts, according to the secretariat of one of the two schools.
The shootings in Aracruz, near the coast about 440 kilometers north of Rio de Janeiro, have deeply shocked the country. Recently elected president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva called the crime “an absurd tragedy”.