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VI. Conditions of Detention

Agostinho M. spent one week in Padre Severino in March 2002, when he was sixteen years old.  “There were twenty or more of us in the dormitory.  Not all of us had a bed.  Two slept in each bed, others on the floor,” he said.  “During the day, we stayed locked up in the dormitory.  They woke us up at 6 a.m., and we had breakfast at 7 a.m.  After that, we returned to the cells.  We were locked up until lunchtime—that was at 1 p.m.  Afterwards we returned to the cells and stayed there until 5 p.m., when it was time for dinner. . . .  Then back to the cells again until it was time to sleep.”  Asked how much time he spent out of his cell each day, he replied that most days it was “a maximum of half an hour, in total.  Every once in a while they would let us out for fresh air [banho de sol].  Not every day, just once in a while.”¹⁵⁸

Poor conditions of confinement are not limited to Padre Severino.  A detention center official in CAI-Baixada forthrightly admitted that his detention center “has nothing to offer these boys.”¹⁵⁹  The stepfather of a sixteen-year-old in Santo Expedito offered an even harsher assessment:  “A dog has better treatment” than youths in Rio de Janeiro’s juvenile detention centers, he told Human Rights Watch.¹⁶⁰

Nor have conditions changed markedly since Human Rights Watch’s visit in July and August 2003.  “The situation with DEGASE is the same as it was in August 2003, only worse,” Simone Moreira de Souza of the public defender’s office reported in February 2004.¹⁶¹  In response, groups of youths periodically risk retaliation by vehemently protesting their detention conditions.  In February 2004, for example, a group of youths in CAI-Baixada went on a two-day hunger strike to protest living conditions and beatings by the guards.¹⁶²

Conditions in Rio de Janeiro’s juvenile detention centers are bad enough that some youths reportedly claim to be adults in order to avoid detention in the juvenile system.  An article in the Jornal do Brasil explained:

The violence against juvenile delinquents in Rio’s detention centers has created a new phenomenon:  In the last five months, the state public defender’s office has found eighteen adolescents who preferred to complete their punishment among adults in police stations or prisons rather than submit to socio-educational measures in state [juvenile detention] facilities.  That is, each month at least three youths pretend to be adults when they are taken prisoner by the police.  Discovered by public defenders or by nongovernmental organizations, they say that it is better to be in the state prison system—implicated in recent months by denunciations of torture, death, and corruption—than to be detained in Department of Socio-Educational Action (DEGASE) institutions.¹⁶³

A dormitory in CAI-Baixada.  © 2004 Stephen Hanmer/ Human Rights Watch.

Overcrowding

With the exception of JoÃo Luis Alves, overcrowding was a serious problem in all of the detention centers we visited, as the table below shows.  A volunteer who works in CAI-Baixada told us that in that center, for example, “Housing conditions are very bad.  The adolescents live in inhuman conditions.  There are maybe 200 in an institution with a capacity of eighty.”¹⁶⁴  In another typical account, Nelson G. told us through the bars of his dormitory in Santo Expedito that twenty-six youths shared the room.  “Some of us sleep on the floor,” he said.¹⁶⁵  In a nearby dormitory, Jimmy D. reported that between seven and ten of twenty-seven youths had mattresses.¹⁶⁶  Such overcrowded conditions lead to increased anxiety and aggressive behavior on the part both of guards and youths, a public defender told Human Rights Watch.¹⁶⁷

Table 1.  Median Population of Rio de Janeiro’s Detention Centers

*The rated capacity for Santo Expedito does not reflect the fact that three of seven cellblocks in the center were not being used when Human Rights Watch visited in July 2003 because their walls and ceilings were in danger of collapse.

**The July 2003 figures for JoÃo Luis Alves do not include nineteen youths temporarily housed in that facility after an attempted escape from Padre Severino.

SOURCE:  Estado do Rio de Janeiro, Secretaria de Estado de Justiça do CidadÃo, Departamento Geral de Ações Sócio-Educativos, “Efectivo Totalizador de Atendimentos – Média Semanal,” July 27, 2003, February 1 and April 11, 2004.

Trash, standing water, and weeds cover a basketball court in Santo Expedito.
© 2004 Stephen Hanmer/Human Rights Watch.

Recreation, Exercise, and Idleness

The lack of activities was a serious problem in CAI-Baixada and Padre Severino; elsewhere we heard fewer complaints.  “The normal day here is that we stay locked up, without anything [to do].  I want to distract myself,” said Alfonso S., a fifteen-year-old detainee in CAI-Baixada.¹⁶⁸  “We should have time outside our cells,” said Carlos A.¹⁶⁹  “They leave us in there without banho de sol,” Dário P., eighteen, told us, using a term that literally means “sunbathing” to refer to fresh air.¹⁷⁰

We heard the same from youths held in Padre Severino.  “They didn’t have activities,” said Jorge N., seventeen.  “They didn’t have church services.  There weren’t any classes.  They had no activities of this kind.  The only thing we did was sleep in our rooms.”¹⁷¹

In Santo Expedito, however, Luciano G. told us that youths frequently had the opportunity for some outdoor recreation, though not every day.  “Football is almost every day, thirty minutes to one hour,” he said.  Later in our interview, he explained that one group of guards routinely denied them outdoor recreation, while the rest usually permitted it.  Referring to that group of guards, he said, “They rarely let us play football or go out in the sun.  Only Shift D [does this]; the others are cool.”¹⁷²  Alex C., a seventeen-year-old held in a different wing of the same detention center, told us that his wing was able to play football about three times each week.  “Football is on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays, about an hour or an hour and a half,” he said.¹⁷³

“We have activities every day,” said Eric T., a fifteen-year-old in JoÃo Luis Alves.  “We play soccer and use the pool.”  He told us that youths in JoÃo Luis Alves spend two hours outdoors most days, with one hour on the soccer field and another hour in the pool.¹⁷⁴

In some instances, officials sought out our assistance in dealing with constraints on recreation for youths in detention.  In Santo Expedito, a guard led us to an unused basketball court littered with refuse.  “Here is the critical part,” he said, telling us that the space would make a good area for recreation and exercise if cleaned up.  “That would address the problem of idleness,” he suggested.¹⁷⁵

International standards call for every youth in detention to have “a suitable amount of time for daily free exercise, in the open air when weather permits,” and “additional time for daily leisure activities.”¹⁷⁶  In conformity with these standards, Brazil’s Statute of the Child and the Adolescent guarantees youths in detention the right to cultural activities, sports, and recreation.¹⁷⁷ 

Contact with the Outside World

Brazilian law guarantees children in detention the right to receive weekly visits.  This right may only be suspended by a judge, and then only temporarily when there are “serious and well founded reasons why such visits would be prejudicial to the interests of the adolescent.”¹⁷⁸  These provisions conform with international standards, which call for states to guarantee children “the right to receive regular and frequent visits, in principle once a week and not less than once a month, in circumstances that respect the need of the juvenile for privacy, contact and unrestricted communication with the family and the defence counsel.”¹⁷⁹

In practice, however, we heard from youths and parents that visitors were at times harassed by guards.  The stepfather of a sixteen-year old in Santo Expedito reported that during one visit to the detention center, “the guards took everything we brought and smashed it on the ground.”¹⁸⁰  Other visitors were subjected to extremely intrusive and humiliating searches that may not have been strictly necessary to ensure the security of the facility.  For instance, Luciano G. reported that his mother “has to take off her clothes” in order to visit him in Santo Expedito.¹⁸¹  And some youths, such as Daniel C., held in CAI-Baixada, were denied visits altogether as a disciplinary measure.¹⁸²

In an additional limitation on visits, some detention centers strictly limited visits to blood relatives, regardless of youths’ particular family situations.  For instance, the stepfather of the sixteen-year-old told us that he was not able to visit his stepson when the boy was in Padre Severino.  “Only his mother [can visit].  I’ve been his stepfather since he was three years old, but they didn’t allow me to enter.  It’s been thirteen years that my wife and I have been together,” the man told us.  After forty-five days in Padre Severino, the boy was moved to Santo Expedito, where his stepfather was able to visit him.¹⁸³

Food

Youth in most detention centers had complaints about the quality and amount of food.  “The food is very bad,” said Carlos A., in CAI-Baixada.  “It’s not enough.”¹⁸⁴  Agostinho M., detained in Padre Severino when he was sixteen, said of the food, “It was disgusting, very bad.  It wasn’t enough for us.”¹⁸⁵

We heard from some parents that youths in Santo Expedito held a hunger strike in order to get better food.¹⁸⁶  Perhaps as a result, some youths reported that the food had recently improved.  “It’s good; it’s gotten better,” said Alex C., seventeen.  “It just got better.  Now it gets to us still hot.”¹⁸⁷

A related complaint was that the last meal of the day often came in the late afternoon, meaning that youths were hungry again at bedtime.  Luciano G., an eighteen-year-old in Santo Expedito, reported, “Dinner is very early.  By 10 p.m., we’re hungry again.”¹⁸⁸  As a result, the sixteen-year-old’s stepfather told us that he and his wife usually brought cookies for their son when they visited.  “Dinner is at 5 p.m., and then there’s nothing until breakfast the following day, so the kids get hungry.  And toothpaste.  He asked for two tubes so he could eat one because he gets hungry at night,” he reported.¹⁸⁹

We heard from other parents about this use of toothpaste.  For example, the mother of a seventeen-year-old in Santo Expedito said, “They eat toothpaste.  They’re hungry.  They eat it because they’re hungry.”¹⁹⁰

One reason for eating toothpaste is that youths are not always able to keep the food their family members bring them.  Luciano G. told us that he had to eat the cookies his mother brought him in the visitors’ room.  “We have to consume them right there in the visiting area,” he said.  “You can’t bring them back to the living area.  That’s the order from the director.”¹⁹¹

A youth in Santo Expedito shows an open wound.
© 2004 Michael Bochenek/Human Rights Watch.