Judgment Onscreen

“So they asked you to take part in the robbery, did they? And what did you do, you went? And do you like the way things are now?”

The voice belongs to Judge Luciana Fiala, during a court hearing with a young offender as he enters Brazil's justice system. “Juizo” (judgment) released this March in Brazil examines the human side – its failures and strengths – of the Juvenile Justice system in Rio de Janeiro.

There are 1,034  adolescents detained in Rio de Janeiro state, according to a survey by the Suboffice for promoting Child and Adolescent Rights, a branch of the Brazilian government's Special Office for Human Rights.

510 of these youths are under full custody; 252 await judgement or sentencing in provisionary detention units, and 272 are carrying out open custody sentences. Rio de Janeiro state has 6.25% of the total number of detainees in Brazil and has lowered by 10.7% the number of teenagers under detainment over the past 11 years.

After reading court proceedings and talking to judges, lawyers, public attorneys, and youths exiting the juvenile justice system, Maria Augusta Ramos filmed 50 court hearings and worked in 10 of them. The filmmaker brought to the silver screen a hot issue in public opinion in Brazil: how youths in conflict with the law are treated in Brazil. “The film asks the public to see for themselves and come to their own conclusions,”said the director.

An offspring of  “Justice”, the director's previous film that depicted the penal system, “Juizo” shows how a court hearing at the Child and Justice Court in Rio de Janeiro works. Onscreen, crying mothers and Judge's rebukes, the movie brings the public something that is hardly ever present in discussions of Brazil's social-educational system (its youth justice system): a portrait that goes beyond numbers and classifications.

“Brazil's youth in conflict with the law and its prison population are problematic issues. Those who find themselves entering the justice system do so due to the complete lack of perspective in getting a job, in getting an education and the lack of health care. That is why they end up there, the Judiciary cannot deal with a problem that is social by nature,” said the director.

Those portrayed in the film are no exception. One striking case depicted is of a youth who runs away from detainment at the Padre Severino Institute, one day prior to being freed having had his sentence commuted from detainment to open custody. The Judge and the Defense Attorney actually laugh when they realize that the boy had run away because he failed to understand his sentence and for lack of assistance in informing him.

Cases like this one make a strong point, describing a gaping chasm between judiciary and the people it ought to serve. With hardly any formal education, youths depicted in the film stand for the over one thousand youths who pass through the state's youth detention system, called the 'General Department of Social and Educational Actions'. The majority of these youths is black, poor, and has little schooling.  And they are doomed to fail to understand their own sentencing. “I was struck by the lack of dialogue, the lack of understanding, between youths in conflict with the law and those responsible for sentencing them,”said Maria Augusta.

The youths who appear on screen are not the actual teen offenders depicted in the film. Brazil's Child and Adolescent Statute prohibits offenders under 18 from being exposed in the media. The filmmaker sought out youths in the city who fit the profile and share the experiences of the youths processed under her watch. “I sat with them, going through the text word for word, asking them to talk as if there were the ones going through the process. They identified themselves with the young offenders, because they live very similar lives,”said the director.

“Juizo” also shows the most cruel side of the system: The Padre Severino Institute, a detainment center where youths are held awaiting the conclusion of the proceedings. The images show daily life of young detainees, arrivals, hearings, their relationship with security agents and their mates. It is a place, according to director Maria Augusta Ramos,  “with minimal resources, the environment is dirty and it smells badly. It reeks of suffering, of pain.”

Read Further:

Juízo (In Portuguese)