The InterAmerican Commission and Human Rights Protection in Brazil

by Audrey Kim

Daniela Ikawa / Courtesy of Audrey Kim

Ms. Daniela Ikawa, a human rights attorney from Brazil and Program Officer at ESCR-net, spoke at the Institute for the Study of Human Rights on November 22, 2011. She discussed her experience bringing the Lazihno vs. Brazil case to the InterAmerican Commission on Human Rights in 2005. The InterAmerican System was established at the same time as the UN Declaration of Human Rights, and its goal is to hold states accountable, to prevent future violations, and to compensate victims. According to Ms. Ikawa, the shift from state-centric values to human values and the idea that every individual has basic rights is very modern. The InterAmerican Commission is a quasi-judicial body composed of experts that keep a high degree of independence from states. The InterAmerican Commission has proven to be surprisingly progressive. This year, for example, it created a unit for gay rights, which does not exist even in the United Nations.

Ms. Ikawa represented Lazinho’s case against Brazil as part of the Connect Us Fund. Lazinho was a poor 16 year old Afro-Brazilian who was held in a juvenile center at Vila Maria, San Paulo. While trying to escape by taking a car parked in front of the center, Lazinho was shot five times at close range and killed. The main suspect was the director of the juvenile center, but the investigation of Lazinho’s murder was conducted very poorly: authorities did not conduct a ballistic exam to check whether the main suspect had a weapon that matched the bullets. Even more egregious, when the director resigned from his position, the authorities closed the case altogether, making it impossible to appeal or move forward.

The story of Lazinho’s death was not an isolated case: state violence and impunity for public figures is a widespread issue in Brazil. According to Ms. Ikawa, approximately 900 people were killed by military and civil officers in Sao Paolo in 2010. Although only about 50 out of thousands of cases are admitted by the commission per year, in 2007 Lazinho’s case was accepted. Ms. Ikawa described her experience in bringing the case to the InterAmerican Commission and explained the broader impact of the commission on human rights protection in Brazil.

NGOs play a crucial role in this judicial process, especially because of the financial inequalities between the parties and politicized nature of the cases. Ms. Ikawa had to ensure that this case told Lazinho’s story and at the same time reflected broader issues. These cases sometimes take up to 10 years for a decision and require extensive resources and effort. The InterAmerican system only has the resources to gather a few times a year. In the hearing for Lazinho’s case, Ms. Ikawa was joined by one student from George Washington University, while Brazil had nine legal representatives. Remarkably, Ms. Ikawa’s team placed enough pressure on Brazil to require Sao Paulo to reopen the investigation and conduct a ballistic test. After the ballistic test, however, the authorities tried to close the investigation once again; the case is still pending.

Cases in the commission are usually resolved through a friendly settlement or a recommendation, and implementation depends on a case by case basis. Along with individual compensation, the courts and states have tried to tackle the root causes of violations through other ways including constructing memorials, enacting legal reform, and promoting new public policies. For instance, the Brazilian government unexpectedly built a park to memorialize the brutal killings of 111 detainees in the Carandiru detention center in 1992. In that case during a riot in the detention center, the military police had disarmed the prisoners, stripped them, and killed them after they were demobilized. In national proceedings, no one had been convicted, and the case was poorly investigated. After the case was presented to the InterAmerican Commission, the Brazilian government built a park at the former site of the detention center, which was a significant gesture indicating that such repression will not be tolerated.

Nonetheless, state-sponsored violence continues to be common in Brazil, and there are still many human rights violations. According to Ms. Ikawala, there are both cultural and economic explanations for the lack of support of human rights values. In particular, Brazil is one of the most economically stratified countries in the world, and this inequality plays a pivotal role in undermining human rights ideals.

Although Brazil has a long history of state violence and impunity, Ms. Ikawala pointed out that there has been significant change in the Brazilian government’s response to human rights. Brazil adopted a decree in 2002 to follow international procedures of human rights, and is now enacting new laws and implementing more compensation. According to Ms. Ikawala, this active response can be seen in the Lazinho’s case. In the first hearing, the defense of the state was unprepared, but in the second hearing, the state representatives were willing to acknowledge their mistakes. While acknowledging the long journey ahead, Ms. Ikawala was optimistic about Brazil’s progress in the protection of its citizens’ human rights.

Published in RightsNews Volume 30, no. 2, February, 2012.
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