|
For Kátia Sento Sé Mello, one of the organizers of the Dossier on Children and Adolescents, launched in March by the Institute of Public Security (IPS) of the state of Rio de Janeiro, this reflects a growing distance between public opinion and reality. Mello cites this growing disparity as stemming from the sensationalization of acts of violence committed by minors. “There exists today a constructed image of youth as being violent by nature, which creates an environment of fear amongst the rest of the population. This image, however, is far from reality, which is in itself quite perverse”, Mello said
One aspect is reflected in the growing insecurity among residents of the “asphalt” (ie. those who do not live in favelas) due to robberies. The state government has attributed this to police operations against drug-dealers, which reduce the profitability of trafficking and thus drive dealers to seek other sources of income – such as street-robbery.
The study compared data from 2002 to 2006 and found that the last year registered the fewest cases of violent crimes committed by and against youths. According to data gathered from Civil Police station records from around the state, between 2005 and 2006 there was, in fact, a decrease in arrests of youth for both drug trafficking and robbery.
“It’s true that we cannot attribute these crimes to youth alone, but public fear is not directly related to incidence of crime”, she said. “The way the media reports on violence is enough to create this sense of public insecurity.”
The research is based only on incident reports by police departments, but Kátia believes that it is a solid first step in trying to understand the panorama of the issue. “Though they do not perfectly reflect the entirety of the situation, the data serve as an effective primary diagnostic” she says. The IPS does not have complete statistics on the victimization of children and youth (statistics which would take into account incidents not reported by the Civil Police) but Kátia guarantees that crimes such as murder, robbery and grand theft auto are less likely to go unreported, and thus the police records are a relatively good representation of reality.
15 to 17 year-olds: most frequent victims and perpetrators of violent crime
15 to 17 year-olds are the age group that is most at-risk for violent crime. 89.1% of the youths arrested belong to this age group. Youths of 16 to 17 years were, additionally, the most frequent victims of murder in 2006, amounting to 68.3% of recorded cases. Mello believes that state policy which integrates health, education and income generation would be more effective in guaranteeing the safety and rights of these youths than repressive policing. “It sounds obvious, but this type of action has still not been seriously implemented in the state of Rio de Janeiro”, Mello said.
Male children and youths are not the most common victims of violent crimes (girls make up 53% of the total), yet were victims in 77.8% of the murder cases reported in the state in 2006. According to Mello, this reflects a shift in the profile of crimes committed by youths, which since the middle of the 1990s has become dominated by drug-trafficking. Youths involved in this type of criminal activity frequently end up victims. “We do not have research specifically on this, but data suggests that this type of activity especially recruits this segment of the population,” Mello states.
The most common locations for the murder of youths are public streets. To Mello, this is not only a reflection of beat policing’s incapability of guaranteeing the safety of youths in the streets, but additionally of the lack of effective application of the ECA. “We need to understand why these adolescents are on the street”, she says. “In addition to this, there must be a greater dialogue between police, state agencies and institutions which treat youth involved in violence”, Mello concludes.
Translated by Daniel Katz
|
