Do homicídio de mulheres ao feminicídio: uma análise a partir do Sistema de Justiça Criminal do Rio de Janeiro

Abstract

This research aims to understand how criminal justice system operators deal with cases of femicide. In the sexist and patriarchal society in which we live, women constantly deal with forms of contempt directed at them. Certainly, race, sexuality, gender and class, for example, are factors that permeate trajectories and make some profiles more vulnerable. In this scenario, which intentional homicide of a woman would not have the component of contempt against her? The Feminicide Law that will be addressed in this research is the one that defined feminicide as a qualifier - Law 13.104/15, since the new legislation, which made feminicide an independent crime in the Penal Code, was only enacted after all the fieldwork had already been completed. Both laws establish that feminicide is the homicide of women in the context of domestic and family violence or due to contempt for the condition of women. To understand how the justice system deals with this aggravating factor, I conducted interviews with justice system operators; I followed femicide trials in a Jury Court in the capital of Rio de Janeiro; and I analyzed cases of femicide and intentional homicide of women that occurred before the Femicide Law No. 13,104/15 was enacted. From then on, I described the course of the cases to which I had access and especially how the operators dealt with the cases, with the victim's memory and with the gender perspective during the processing and judgment. I developed some categories to discuss the existence of an “exemplary victim” of femicide for the justice system, as being women who “did not put themselves at risk” and were still killed, usually by their partners or ex-partners. In addition, I was able to perceive similarities between cases of femicide and intentional homicide of women, since in any case we are talking about intentional deaths against women, which involve techniques of contempt when killing. I present a debate about the multiple ways of being a woman that can also interfere in the multiple forms of feminicide. However, the lack of objective criteria to establish what should be considered feminicide means that, in addition to a qualifier, in the cases analyzed here, feminicide is also a category in dispute. The way the Law was designed means that intentional homicides that occurred in the context of domestic violence are classified as feminicide. When the homicide occurs in other contexts, it is up to the security and justice agents to decide whether or not to apply the qualifier. This means that most feminicides are linked to domestic violence and are perpetrated by partners or ex-partners. For this reason, I understand that the central agent of the Law is no longer the woman and becomes the violent man who killed her, the application of the Law ends up being conditioned on the known authorship of the partner or ex-partner and not the victimized woman. This creates the need to review the legislation to establish specific criteria for what should be considered contempt for the status of women.