A self-feeding cycle of crime and vengeance
In Brazil, a grave problem remains hidden in plain sight: the rising power's wave of vigilantism.
By Pedro Henrique Leal
In May the 3rd 2014, the Morrinhos community in the city of Guarujá was taken by violence; incensed with rumors of kidnappings and black magic rituals, locals confronted what they sawas their nemesis – and dealt with it swiftly, and brutally. “I also have kids. I thought it was true,” claimed Valmir Dias Barbosa, a local resident and participant in the lynching that took place. They were yelling “beat her, get her, get her!”, he told police authorities.
The victim was Fabiane Maria de Jesus, a 33-year-old housewife, heading back to church to recover her misplaced bible. She was tortured for two hours before dying on her way to the hospital. Her plight was recorded on video and uploaded by her executioners. She became the 20th fatal case in a gruesome statistic in Brazil: the recent wave of vigilante justice cases in the world's 7th largest economy.
While not unheard of in previous years – the period between 1980 and 2006 had a total of 1179 lynchings - this sort of ‘mob justice’ is facing a surge in numbers since the beginning of theyear: between February and the first week of May alone, there have been 37 lynchings in Brazil, according to the Brazilian Order of Lawyers (OAB). And according to UFMG professor of sociology José de Souza Martins, in a Tribuna de Minas article, during the last three years the number of attempted lynchings went from three per week to almost two per day.
The crimes she was accused of never existed, according to the authorities. Her shocking – and futile – death exposes a paradox in the rising power: how come an ambitious nation such as Brazil – host to two major sporting events, in 2014 and 2016 – and who aims for regional leadership, also stages such savage displays of violence?
Lacking justice
This urge to ‘take justice in their own hands’ might be related to a general sensation that justice is failing: for many Brazilians, the general feeling is that the authorities aren't doing enough to fight crime, and since the cops are not going to solve the issue, then they ought to solve it themselves. This logic was the justification used by some in the press to excuse previous actions.
Such a mentality might be due to skewed perceptions of reality, claims penal Justice João Marcos Buch. “There is a collective and paranoid desire for revenge, made manifest by people in their homes and workplaces, fed by images of tragedy and disgrace that are not the common reality,” he explains.
To many, the solution depends on making laws ‘stronger’, by reducing penal maturity, applying the death penalty and making the use of force by the police easier. While part of the so-called progressive party, neo-conservative lawmaker Jair Messias Bolsonaro is one such proponent. An ardent supporter of torture, congressman Bolsonaro claimed to Brasilpost that the favelas – that concentrate most of the country's violence – are safe from criminality “because there you get the death penalty.” He also accuses that it is thanks to human rights activists that the crime rate in Brazil is rising, as “in the asphalt” (as he describe the city centers), crooks have those who defend them.
According to the USP researcher Ariadne Natal, the lynching practice goes beyond punishing the crime. “The intent is to take the violence to the extreme to show discontentment with the State, so it is not enough to kill, to maim. You must expose the body,” she noted to Estado de Minas. This, she claims, explains why many attacks are filmed and posted online. Twenty-five years ago, another brutal case made international news when three suspected thieves were burned alive and filmed in the city of Matupá – with conflicting reports: while investigations indicate that the authorities handed over the suspects to the lynch mob, cops claim the victims escaped arrest and when they saw the execution it was too late.
State of violence
Ambiguities such as the Matupá massacre are not exceptions, and the actions of the police often contradict the feeling that the law is too ‘soft on crime’: in the city of São Paulo alone, the authorities kill an average of three suspects each day. The so-called “pacification” operations in the favelas are marked by violent repression, abuse of authority and legal anomalies such as collective search warrants. Whilst people claim “no one gets arrested”, the country maintains the world's third-largest prison population – of around 715.000. A third of which haven't faced trial yet, and a tenth who already paid their sentences, according to the National Justice Council. In 14 years, the number of prisoners tripled – from the 250.000 in 2000.
According to Cynthia Pinto da Luz, a human rights lawyer and head of the Human Rights Center in the city of Joinville, the law enforcement mechanisms in Brazil do not serve the population. “We see a public safety policy, in all levels of the Federation, based solely in repression and acquisition of patrol vehicles and weaponry, neglecting the real causes of violence,” she notes, adding that since impunity is common place among the police it is easy for cops, facing no repercussion for their actions, to turn to crime.
The behavior of the Brazilian police raises international concerns: in 2012, the UN Human Rights Council recommended the disbandment of the Brazilian Military Police, in a motion led by Denmark and South Korea; during the Periodical Universal Examination of the country, the UN raised concerns over the amount of ‘extra-judicial executions’ performed by cops, and South Korea explicitly noted the actions of ‘death squads’ among the police. The picture is further compounded by a 2014 Amnesty International report that indicated that 80 percent of Brazilians fear they might be tortured by the authorities.
This behavior might be an inheritance from the military regime (1964-1985) and the repressive mentality of the time, notes da Luz. “The same mechanisms that oppressed us in the past are seen as a reference for some of those who make 'justice with their own hands' as a means to solve their problems,” she explains. During those so-called ‘lead years’, torture and executions became commonplace (with over 2000 tortured between 1969 and 1970 alone) – and many Brazilians yearn for that system to return. ‘Clean-ups’ such as the Candelária massacre in 1993 – when military police officers killed eight homeless kids in front of a church – often go unpunished: while the culprits are tried and sentenced, they are rarely sent to prison.
Labeling and neglect
Another factor that perhaps ‘naturalizes’ taking justice in ‘your own hands’ is the stigma associated with crime in Brazil: much like Victor Hugo's tragic protagonist Jean Valjean in ‘Les Misérables’ – antagonized and persecuted as a ‘dangerous criminal’ for stealing a loaf of bread – regardless of their guilt, criminals in Brazil are labeled as the worst of the worst – and often, appearances are all one needs to be labeled a ‘bandit’. Racial and social prejudice mingles, and being poorly dressed or dark-skinned is often ‘proof’ enough. To one of the suspects in Fabiane's death, the fact that so many people were attacking her was enough to convince him in joining the barbarity.
The label ‘bandit’ easily changes one from a small-time wallet thief into a serial murderer-rapist-kidnapper – as happened in February when a biker gang tied a naked 15-year-old homeless kid to a light post in Rio de Janeiro. Online commentators claimed – before any proof the kid ever committed any crimes – that he “deserved it for the people he killed”; at the time, SBT news anchor Rachel Scheherazade called the action “legitimate self defense of society”. This thanks to a binary way of thinking, dividing society in only two categories: the criminals and the ‘good citizens’, both in-born and definitive – a bandit is always a bandit, and a good man is incorruptible; if he falters, he is always a criminal.
That in great part comes from a lack of empathy for the other, notes Judge Buch. “People see someone committing a crime, and conclude that the culprit is violent because he wants and chose to,” he explains, noting that most ignore the lack of opportunities and stability faced by the less privileged.
Meanwhile, low-income communities are often neglected completely by the State. With little in terms of health care or public education, no sanitation services, and missing basic infrastructure, the sole presence of the State in many a favela, occupation area or poor neighborhood is through violent police action. Mistrustful of the authorities, this scenario is fertile ground for parallel states, governed by drug dealers and marked by ‘people's courts’ and vigilante militias. At the same time, thanks to prejudice and lack of education preventing access to the work force, youths from those communities often are left with little choice but crime – be it to support their families, or to support drug addictions. Often both.
A discourse of violence
Brazilian news outlets might have played a role in the rise of vigilantism in Brazil. While the country does maintain one of the highest murder rates in the planet – of 25,2 violent deaths per 100.000 inhabitants – mainstream press paints a picture of even greater violence. “Take for example Rio de Janeiro, proportionally it is far from the most violent city in the country, and in everyday life people lead peaceful lives, but if a bus is held hostage, media reacts as if millions were victimized,” notes Judge Buch. Meanwhile, police news TV anchors often praise violent ‘crime fighting’ actions by the police, and exhort the need to eliminate ‘the criminal scum’.
Some defend a greater control over the media discourse as a solution in this sense. One such proposal came right after SBT's praise of vigilante action in Rio: led by congresswoman Jandira Feghali, of the Brazilian Communist Party (PcdoB), left wing parties attempted to prosecute the news anchor for promoting violence. The motion was met with skepticism, seem as an attempt to “implement censorship”, and as an excuse to “silence those who criticize the government.” Scheherazade later claimed she never praised the action – she only said it was “understandable”, legitimate, and those who disagreed ought to “take them [the bandits] home”.
According to El País columnist Eliane Brum, this discourse is apparent even when the press seems shocked. As she notes, the outrage over the Fabiane case was not over the barbaric display of violence, but the fact that the victim was innocent – in a way, making it seem that in case the suspect is guilty, then lynching becomes acceptable. Her article ends on a heavy note: crying over the innocent is easy – civilization demands we respect the lives of murderers, something no one seemed to consider in the whole ordeal.
Online rumor mills to blame?
While not often a factor in such cases, Fabiane's case in specific relates to another issue: the attack was preceded by a Facebook news page posting alleged composite sketches of the “witch” and alerting of the “child killer” – and the rumors posted online motivated the mob action. To many participants in the lynching of Fabiane, this factor ought to exempt them of guilt. “You want to arrest everyone? Everyone is guilty! No one is guilty! The internet is to blame!” one of the suspects yelled after the first arrest, according to news magazine Exame.
However, the promotion of violence online goes beyond the rumors: Just as it happens in part of the mainstream press, on the web numerous pages such as TV Revolta and Faca na Caveira (tied to the São Paulo Military Police) fiercely promote the idea that “the only good bandit is a dead bandit”, defending torture and execution and attacking the idea of human rights. Some of those pages go a step further, advocating violence against those who oppose killing criminals.
In reaction to the offline repercussions of online fear mongering, Brazil might legislate over “usage of internet in ways that result in physical harm” - the proposed legislation might be named after the now famous victim.
A fork on the road
Brazil remains torn on how to deal with lynchings just as it is torn on how to deal with crime in general. Either it strengthens the same crime-fighting policies that led to its current state – policies that do little to fight the causes of violence, as noted by da Luz – in order to “beat crime into submission”, or it needs to undergo severe changes in policy and culture to curtail the escalation of violence. “Urban violence is only going to diminish when the State is present with social inclusion policies, focuses on the youth and reduce penalizing legislation,” expounds judge Buch.
On a sore note, the same day Fabiane Maria de Jesus’ death was confirmed, on May 5th 2014, another lynching victim died – his name, the crime he was accused of – none of that made it to the news: just a small, tiny footnote in a history of violence, lost amidst the police pages of the newspapers. In any case, perhaps it is time for the country to stop and think how it can break this cycle – and stop mixing justice with vengeance.
Pedro Henrique Leal is a freelance journalist from Brazil, specializing in human rights and violence issues. He also writes about comic books and social issues. Weekly column at coletivometranca.com.br.
Photo by Wilson Dias/ABr via Wiki Commons.
