The Legitimation of Police Violence as a Government Strategy

a case study from Rio Grande do Sul

Abstract

Brazilian society is still characterized by the abusive use of violence by public security agents. The interactions between civil society and the police are still marked by abuse of power, lack of criteria for the use of force and mistrust, which produce high rates of police killings and police victimization, evidence of an authoritarian and inefficient police. When government guidance is justified by police violence, and the judiciary itself is lenient in processing complaints, the trend is to increase the number of cases. In order to deal with this complex phenomenon, it was sought to analyze cases of police violence practiced by the Rio Grande do Sul Military Police between 2014 and 2016, based on records made by the Human Rights Reference Center of the Public Defender. Based on this records, it was possible to analyze the context in which they occur, the profile of victims and aggressors, as well as the referral given to the cases analyzed. 279 Procedures for Determining Individual Damage (PADINs) were analyzed. The reports of police violence carried out in custody hearings in the Porto Alegre region were also analyzed. Held at a specific place in the Central Prison, audiences were observed for two months (December 2016 and January 2017), and data were collected through the completion of a research form, within the scope of a project linked to the CNJ Research Program. Through the analysis of the collected data, we sought to identify the elements that characterize the cases of police violence in the city of Porto Alegre in the last period, as well as the referral given by the judicial institutions for the reported cases. Finally, we intend to present some of the causes of the phenomenon of the increase of police violence in the last period.