Uma bolha de perfis e sensibilidades: etnografia do processamento de crimes federais em Fortaleza/CE

Abstract

The processing of federal crimes in Fortaleza, in the Ceará state is the main subject of this study, which focused mainly on two of the courts with hearings held in 2018, as well as some other cases that were brought up during the narrative of the interlocutors. As for the methods, the research involved the observation of hearings, the interview of actors of the federal criminal justice system and the reading of legal pieces, with data tabulation. Initially, the student's credential was used, without neglecting the reflexivity proper to a researcher who is part of the studied system, which allowed the use of memories as a source of data for the research. The system was described as a "bubble", with distinctive features in relation to other justice systems, from the types of crimes that are tried, mostly marked by documentary evidence, without removing the human character present throughout criminal universe. The privileged structure of this system and the judges' interpretative task of creating and adapting the process with personal marks were also addressed. The system was shown to work from a case of a young man of African origin, arrested with someone else's passport, who served his full sentence in prison. Starting from the idea of “classism”, the limitation of the dichotomous imagery “guaranteeism-punitivism” and the symbolism of an isosceles triangle-shaped process was exposed, due to the presence and the powers of the police, the position of “mitigated bias” of the prosecutor and the role played by the judges. To finalize, “discretion” and “good law” were two categories created as a way of exposing that court decisions can be moved by sensitivities, but also come within the limits of the possible inferences of “official normativity” and are subject to self-restraint with ethical character, regarded as having a sense of responsibility in judging well.