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III. The Juvenile Justice System in Rio de Janeiro

Just over 1,700 youths between the ages of twelve and twenty-one were in Rio de Janeiro’s juvenile justice system in January 2004.  Of that total, nearly 900 were awaiting trial or had been sentenced to periods of detention; the rest were on probation or completing community service.14

These youths are detained under Brazil’s national juvenile justice law.  Adopted in 1990 in a comprehensive overhaul intended to implement Brazil’s obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the juvenile justice law is on paper a model statute.  “The problem is the practice,” said Eliana Rocha of the nongovernmental organization Brazilian Family Welfare (Bem-Estar Familiar no Brasil, BEMFAM).15  Juvenile detention facilities in the state of Rio de Janeiro are overcrowded, understaffed, dangerous, and filthy.  Although these institutions are officially termed “socio-educational” centers, they have almost no capacity for or commitment to providing education, vocational training, or rehabilitative services.

The gulf between law and practice is not lost on youths or their parents.  As the mother of one detainee told Human Rights Watch, in an ironic play on the Portuguese words “educativo” (educational) and “espancativo” (relating to a bashing), “The system is not socio-education, it is social beating.”16

The Statute of the Child and the Adolescent

Brazil’s national juvenile justice law is found in the Statute of the Child and the Adolescent.17  (The adult criminal justice system is also governed by a single national law.18)  Under the statute, youths aged twelve through seventeen, whom it terms “adolescents,” are charged under Brazil’s juvenile justice law.  The provisions relating to detention provide that youths may be held in juvenile detention centers up to the age of twenty-one.  Delinquent children under the age of twelve are not criminally responsible; instead, they are treated as children in need of protection.19

Once arrested, a youth under the age of eighteen should be released to a parent or a responsible adult; deprivation of liberty should be limited to serious cases in which the youth’s safety or the public order requires it.20  If they are detained, youths may be held in police lockups for no more than five days, after which they must be released or transferred to a juvenile detention center.21  Youths who are held in police lockups must be placed “in a section isolated from adults and with appropriate installations.”22

As Human Rights Watch has found elsewhere in Brazil, the five-day limitation does not provide youths with effective protection from mistreatment.  Police stations are subject to less independent oversight than juvenile detention centers, and both youths and adults routinely report that they are subjected to beatings and torture at the hands of police during and after arrest.23  Such abuses often go unreported, as illustrated by one account from the stepfather of a sixteen-year-old boy held in Santo Expedito.  The man told Human Rights Watch that his son was not permitted to call him for more than twelve hours after he was arrested.  “He was arrested between 11 a.m. and noon, and he didn’t call until midnight.  He told me that he didn’t have a way to call.  The police didn’t let him,” the boy’s stepfather said.  “I think he was beaten.”  When asked how he knew, he replied, “Because he had marks on his face, very visible.  He couldn’t talk because the officer was right next to him, with his truncheon (cassetete) in his hand.  [My son] said he hit his head on the car door.”24

Youths may be held in pretrial detention “for a maximum period of forty-five days”;25 the statute further provides that if an adolescent is placed in pretrial detention, “the maximum and nonextendable period for conclusion of the [judicial] proceedings shall be forty-five days.”26  Despite this legal requirement, Human Rights Watch interviewed youths who told us that they had been held pending trial far in excess of forty-five days.  Vitor M., fifteen, told us that he had been in Padre Severino for over ninety days in pretrial detention.  He had not spoken to his mother or any other family member during that time, and he feared that they did not know where he was.27  Similarly, sixteen-year-old Romário N. told us that he had been in Padre Severino for ninety days without a sentence.28  Patrícia K., a sixteen-year-old held in Santos Dumont, told us that she had been held for more than 120 days without a sentence.29  A study by the Universidade Candido Mendes and the Rio de Janeiro State University (Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro) found that the forty-five day limitation on pretrial detention was often not observed by state authorities.30

Delinquent youths may be sentenced to any of six “socioeducational measures”:  warning, reparations, community service, probation (liberdade assistida), semiliberty, and confinement in a detention center.31  The strictest of these measures, detention (internaçÃo), should be imposed only when individually warranted, in exceptional circumstances, and for the shortest possible time.32  This principle conforms to the standard set forth in the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which provides that arrest, detention, and imprisonment of a child “shall be used only as a measure of last resort and for the shortest appropriate period of time.”33

Under Brazilian law, detention of a youth may last no more than three years and may not extend beyond the age of twenty-one.34  Regardless of the length of the sentence, the judge must reevaluate the decision to detain a child at least every six months.  As part of this review process, social workers with the detention centers must file reports twice yearly on each youth in detention.  Human Rights Watch heard frequent complaints from social workers and public defenders that judges tend to renew detention regardless of the recommendations contained in the reports.  “The judges only do a pro forma evaluation,” one public defender told Human Rights Watch.35

Legal Representation

Brazilian law guarantees youths the right to legal representation, including free legal assistance to those in need.36  Most of the youths interviewed by Human Rights Watch were represented by public defenders.  Sir Nigel Rodley, then the U.N. special rapporteur on torture, observed in 2001 that “in many states public defenders . . . are paid so poorly in comparison with prosecutors that their level of motivation, commitment and influence are severely lacking.”37 Many of the public defenders we spoke with in Rio de Janeiro reiterated this point, and in October 2004 the state’s public defenders went on strike briefly to draw attention to the lack of parity in pay between public defenders and public prosecutors.38

Juvenile Detention in Rio de Janeiro

Juvenile detention centers in Brazil are administered by state rather than by federal authorities.  Each of the twenty-six states and the federal district has its own organizational structure, develops its own policies, and manages a separate set of juvenile detention facilities.  In the state of Rio de Janeiro, juvenile detention centers are administered by the Department of Socio-Educational Action (Departamento Geral de Ações Sócio-Educativas, DEGASE), an agency of the Secretariat of State for Justice and the Rights of Citizens (Secretaria de Estado de Justiça e Direitos do CidadÃo).39

Human Rights Watch visited the state’s five juvenile detention facilities.  All but one of these centers, CAI-Belford Roxo, are located in the metropolitan area of Rio de Janeiro.  In addition to these facilities, the state of Rio de Janeiro administers a triage and reception facility (Centro de Triagem e RecepçÃo) and sixteen centers for youths serving the lesser sanction of semi-liberty, a measure that allows youths some freedom to work in the community and have overnight visits with family members (Centros de Recursos Integrados de Atendimento ao Menor, CRIAMs).

Efforts to Reduce the Age of Criminal Responsibility

There is popular support in Brazil, as in other countries in the region, for reducing the age at which children can be charged in adult criminal courts instead of in specialized juvenile courts.  A nationwide poll in December 2003 by the Folha de S. Paulo, Brazil’s largest newspaper, found that 84 percent of respondents supported a proposal that would charge fifteen-year-olds in the adult system.40

Such views stem in part from the inaccurate perception that youths under age eighteen are responsible for the majority of violent crimes.41  In fact, when SÃo Paulo’s Public Security Office examined violent crimes in that state, it found that youths under the age of eighteen were responsible for 1 percent of all homicides, 1.5 percent of robberies by threat or force (roubos), and 2.6 percent of armed robberies resulting in death (latrocínios).42  “These numbers are breaking down the myth of the dangerousness of youths and show that a reduction in the age of criminal responsibility will have a very small, ineffective impact,” said Túlio Kahn, a sociologist with the Special Secretariat for Human Rights, speaking of crime rates in SÃo Paulo.43

Figures for the city of Rio de Janeiro show similarly low rates for violent offenses committed by juveniles.  Youths under the age of eighteen were identified as responsible for approximately 2.2 percent of homicides and 1.6 percent of robberies by threat or force in 2001, according to data from the state public security secretariat.44  These numbers do not include unsolved cases or other cases in which the age of the responsible party is not known.  Even so, these data suggest that youths under the age of eighteen commit only a small share of the city’s violent crime.

In fact, the data indicate that youths under eighteen are responsible for disproportionately fewer violent offenses than their share of Rio de Janeiro’s population would suggest.  In 2000, for example, youths between the ages of ten and eighteen accounted for 12.5 percent of the city’s population but committed only 1.5 percent of homicides and 1.7 percent of robberies by threat or force.  Even if all of these offenses were attributed to youths aged fifteen to seventeen, who constituted 4.9 percent of the city’s population in 2000 and who might be expected to be responsible for most violent juvenile offenses, the juvenile crime rates for these offenses are still lower than would be expected if fifteen- to seventeen-year-old youths committed crimes in direct proportion to their share of the population.  The same is true even accounting for fluctuations in the crime rates:  Even at their peaks, homicides and robberies by threat or force attributed to youths under eighteen never reached 3 percent in any year between 1991 and 2001, as illustrated by the chart below.45

SOURCE:  Núcleo de Pesquisa e Análise Criminal, Secretaria de Estado de Segurança Pública, Coordenadoria de Segurança, Justiça, Defesa Civil e Cidadania,  Governo do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Anuário estatístico do núcleo de pesquisa e análise criminal (Rio de Janeiro:  Governo do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, 2002), http://www.novapolicia.rj.gov.br/f_aisp2.htm (viewed November 1, 2004).  See also Dowdney, Children of the Drug Trade, p. 119.

A related misperception is that the vast majority of youths in Brazil’s juvenile facilities are detained for acts of violence.  In fact, most youths charged under the Statute of the Child and the Adolescent in Rio de Janeiro are detained for nonviolent offenses.  In September and October 2002, for example, 537 cases were serious enough to warrant detention in a closed facility (internaçÃo), the most restrictive of the six “socio-educational measures” authorized by law.  Of that total, 148 youths (27.6 percent of the total) were convicted of robbery by threat or force and 46 (8.6 percent) were convicted of homicide.  Thirty-one (5.8 percent) were convicted of petty theft.  Two hundred thirty-six youths, or 43.9 percent, were convicted of drug trafficking—offenses that are often accompanied by acts of violence but not themselves crimes of violence.  (When drug trafficking involves homicide or other violent crimes, those crimes should appear as separate charges.)  Including those convicted for drug offenses, at least 315 youths, nearly 60 percent the total number of youths in detention in September and October 2002, were held for nonviolent offenses.46  These figures are likely to overstate the prevalence of violent youth crime because they include only the most serious offenses and include all youths in detention during the two-month period without regard to the length of time they have served.  In that regard, it is all the more significant that three of every five youths serving sentences in the state’s most restrictive facilities were held for nonviolent offenses.

These data indicate that adults, rather than youths under the age of eighteen, are responsible for the vast majority of violent crime in Rio de Janeiro and elsewhere in Brazil.  Even so, Brazilian lawmakers periodically propose measures that would lower the age of criminal responsibility, either to permit youths under eighteen to be prosecuted as adults or to allow children under twelve to be adjudicated in the juvenile justice system.  To date, President Lula da Silva’s administration has energetically rejected such proposals.  “Lowering the age of criminal responsibility will not solve anything,” Márcio Thomasz Bastos, Brazil’s minister of justice, said in remarks to the press in November 2003.  Instead, he argued, “The way to lower crime is to increase the effectiveness of the police, the efficiency of the judiciary, and to improve conditions in the prison system.”47  Nilmário Miranda, minister in chief of the Special Secretariat for Human Rights, has made similar remarks.  “Reducing the [age of] criminal responsibility doesn’t tackle the roots of violence.  Offering more severe penalties for those who lead adolescents into criminal activities is a good proposal to restrict violence,” he said in a statement released the same month.48



During a surprise inspection in July 2003, prosecutors discovered thirteen youths in this dimly lit, poorly ventilated Padre Severino punishment cell, viewed here from the outside.  Locked inside for days in close quarters, the youths slept on the concrete floor with no mattresses or bedding.
© 2004 Stephen Hanmer/Human Rights Watch.



Police sealed Padre Severino’s punishment cell after prosecutors concluded that it was “inhumane,” a finding which DEGASE director general Sérgio Novo dismissed as “fantasy.”
© 2004 Stephen Hanmer/Human Rights Watch.




[14] See Secretaria Especial dos Direitos Humanos, Subsecretaria de PromoçÃo dos Direitos da Criança e do Adolescente, “Levantamento estatístico do número de adolescentes cumprindo medidas sócio-educativas, no Brasil, em janeiro de 2004,” www.presidencia.gov.br/sedh (viewed June 23, 2004), tables 2 and 13 (showing a total of 1,706 youths in the juvenile justice system, of whom 896 were in pretrial detention or sentenced to detention or semiliberty and 810 were sentenced to probation (liberdade assistida)).  Human Rights Watch was unable to get a breakdown of how many of these youths were below the age of eighteen.

[15] Human Rights Watch interview with Eliana Rocha, Bem-Estar Familiar no Brasil, Rio de Janeiro, July 28, 2003.

[16] “O sistema nÃo é sócio-educativo; é sócio-espancativo.”  Human Rights Watch interview with mother of youth in detention, Rio de Janeiro, August 1, 2003.

[17] Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente, Law No. 8,069 of July 13, 1990.

[18] See Lei de ExecuçÃo Penal, Decree-Law No. 7,210 of July 11, 1984.

[19] Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente, arts. 2, 105, 121.  See also Munir Cury et al., coords., Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente comentado:  comentários jurídicos e sociais, 4th ed. (SÃo Paulo:  Malheiros Editores Ltda., 2002), pp. 14-15, 334-35.

[20] “Comparecendo qualquer dos pais ou responsável, o adolescente será prontamente liberado pela autoridade policial, sob termo de compromisso e responsabilidade de sua apresentaçÃo ao representante do Ministério Público, no mesmo dia ou, sendo impossível, no primeiro dia útil imediato, exceto quando, pela gravidade do ato infracional e sua repercussÃo social, deva o adolescente permanecer sob internaçÃo para garantia de sua segurança pessoal ou manutenaçÃo da ordem pública.”  Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente, art. 174.

[21] “Sendo impossível a pronta transferência, o adolescente aguardará sua remoçÃo em repartiçÃo policial, desde que em seçÃo isolada dos adultos e com instalações apropriadas, nÃo podendo ultrapassar o prazo máximo de cinco dias, sob pena de responsabilidade.”  Ibid., art. 185, para. 2.

[22] Ibid.  Separation from adults is a basic requirement of international law.  See Convention on the Rights of the Child, art. 37(c) (noting that “every child deprived of liberty shall be separated from adults unless it is considered in the child’s best interest not to do so”).

[23] See, for example, Human Rights Watch/Americas, Police Brutality in Urban Brazil (New York:  Human Rights Watch, 1997), pp. 28-31; Human Rights Watch, Behind Bars in Brazil, pp. 38-44; Human Rights Watch, Cruel Confinement:  Abuses Against Detained Children in Northern Brazil (New York:  Human Rights Watch, 2003), pp. 8-9.

[24] Human Rights Watch interview with stepfather of youth in detention, Rio de Janeiro, August 1, 2003.

[25] “A internaçÃo, antes da sentença, pode ser determinada pelo prazo máximo de quarenta e cinco dias.”  Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente, art. 108.

[26] “O prazo máximo e improrrogável para a conclusÃo do procedimento, estando o adolescente internado provisoriamente, será de quarenta e cinco dias.”  Ibid., art. 183.

[27] Human Rights Watch interview with Vitor M., Instituto Padre Severino, July 29, 2003.

[28] Human Rights Watch interview with Romário N., Instituto Padre Severino, July 29, 2003.

[29] Human Rights Watch interview with Patrícia K., Educandário Santos Dumont, July 29, 2003.

[30] See JoÃo Trajano Sento-Sé, “Perfil dos jovens em conflicto com a lei no Rio de Janeiro” (Rio de Janeiro:  Universidade Candido Mendes and Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, 2003), p. 19.

[31] Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente, art. 112. For a brief description of these measures, see Mário Volpi, ed., O adolescente e o ato infracional, 4th ed. (SÃo Paulo:  Cortez Editora, 1997), pp. 23-44.

[32] “A internaçÃo constitui medida privativa da libertade, sujeita aos princípios da brevidade, excepcionalidade e respeito à condiçÃo peculiar de pessoa em desenvolvimento.”  Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente, art. 121.

[33] Convention on the Rights of the Child, art. 37(b).

[34] Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente, art. 121, paras. 2-5.

[35] Human Rights Watch interview with public defender, Rio de Janeiro, July 28, 2003.

[36] Estatuto da Criança e do Adolescente, art. 111.

[37] Report of the Special Rapporteur, Sir Nigel Rodley, para. 162.

[38] See AssociaçÃo dos Defensores Públicos do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, “ParalisaçÃo – 18 a 22/10,” http://www.adperj.com.br (viewed November 17, 2004); “Defensores públicos entram em greve no Rio,” Último Segundo, http://ultimosegundo.ig.com.br/materias/brasil/1774001-1774500/1774031/1774031_1.xml (viewed November 17, 2004).

[39] See Decreto No. 32,621 of January 1, 2003 (State of Rio de Janeiro).

[40] Gilmar Penteado, “84% apóiam reduçÃo da maioridade penal,” Folha de S. Paulo, January 1, 2004, p. C3

(poll taken in December 2003 and based on 12,180 respondents in 396 cities and towns across Brazil).

[41] See, for example, Ministério da Justiça, Secretaria de Estado de Dereitos Humanos, Departamento da Criança e do Adolescente, and Instituto de Pesquisa Econômica Aplicada, Mapeamento da situaçÃo das unidades de execuçÃo de medida socioeducativa de privaçÃo de libertade ao adolescente em conflito com a lei (Brasília: Ministério da Justiça, December 2002), p. 19.

[42] Gilmar Penteado, “Menor participa de 1% dos homicídios em SP,” Folha de S. Paulo, January 1, 2004, p. C3.

[43] “Esses números derrubam o mito da periculosidade dos jovens e mostram que a reduçÃo da maioridade penal vai ter um impacto muito pequeno e ineficaz.”  Ibid.

[44] Núcleo de Pesquisa e Análise Criminal, Secretaria de Estado de Segurança Pública, Coordenadoria de Segurança, Justiça, Defesa Civil e Cidadania,  Governo do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Anuário estatístico do núcleo de pesquisa e análise criminal (Rio de Janeiro:  Governo do Estado do Rio de Janeiro, 2002), http://www.novapolicia.rj.gov.br/f_aisp2.htm (viewed November 1, 2004).  See also Dowdney, Children of the Drug Trade, pp. 119.

[45] Ministério do Planejamento, Orçamento e GestÃo, Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística, Censo 2000, http://www.ibge.gov.br/censo/default.php (viewed November 17, 2004).

[46] See Ministério da Justiça, Secretaria de Estado dos Direitos Humanos, Departamento da Criança e do Adolescente, and Instituto de Pesquisa Econômica Aplicada, Mapeamento da situaçÃo das unidades, p. 21.

[47] “‘Diminuir a maioridade penal nÃo resolve nada. A soluçÃo para a diminuir a criminalidade é aumentar a eficácia da polícia, a eficiência do Judiciário e melhorar as condições do sistema prisional,’ pondera. Segundo o ministro, a medida seria inútil e nÃo tem sentido, pois expõe jovens ainda em formaçÃo ao convívio ‘terrível’ do sistema prisional.”  “Ministro quer sinergia entre estados para combater a violência,” Noticias, November 13, 2003, http://www.mj.gov.br/noticias/2003/novembro/RLS131103-sinergia.htm (viewed April 8, 2004).

[48] “Reduzir a maioridade penal nÃo ataca as raízes da violência. Propor penas mais severas para aqueles que induzem os adolescentes à prática criminal é uma boa proposta para coibir a violência.”  “Nilmário Miranda e ONGs repudiam reduçÃo da maioridade penal,” November 14, 2003, www.mj.gov.br/sedh/ct/conanda/ noticias2.asp?id=82 (viewed April 8, 2004).


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