Eighty Percent of Brazil’s Inmates are Undocumented, Says National Council of Justice

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – An unprecedented study by the National Council of Justice (CNJ) points out that only five states in Brazil have control over the personal documentation of their respective prison populations.

According to the president of the Federal Supreme Court and the CNJ, Justice Dias Toffoli, 80 percent of all prisoners, estimated at 797,000, have no essential documents required for the exercise of citizenship.

The CNJ regards an employment booklet, identity card, birth certificate, voter’s card, and Individual Tax Registry (CPF) as essential documents. The Estado newspaper had access to the survey’s details, designed to provide public policies focused on inmates.

According to the council, the absence of these documents is detrimental to prisoners. Without a CPF, for instance, even if there is a school within the penitentiary unit, the prisoner cannot enroll.

The lack of an ID card (RG) precludes obtaining the public health system card. Moreover, the employment booklet is crucial for the detainee to reconcile his activity while in the work release system, which hinders social reintegration.

In a public event at the end of June, held at the Superior Electoral Court (TSE), Justice Toffoli criticized the Brazilian government’s ignorance of the country’s prison population.

At the time, Justice Toffoli signed a technical cooperation agreement between CNJ and TSE for the development of a biometric registration database and the issuing of documents for the prison population in the country’s 2,500 prisons.

The Justice stressed that even today, the number of prisoners who work or study does not exceed 30 percent of the prison population — according to technicians of the CNJ, 15 percent study, and 17 percent work.

“And they are entitled to engage in this type of activity, particularly because it is part of the reintegration of the convicted person into Brazilian society. Therefore, access to civil documentation is the path we envisage for their citizenship.”

The issue of prisoners’ documents will begin in January, with the help of public notaries. In parallel, the CNJ will start a joint effort to register the biometrics of the prison population. Everything is expected to be completed by September.

According to the supervising judge of CNJ’s Department of Monitoring and Inspection of the Prison System, Luís Geraldo Lanfredi, in the North, Northeast and Center-West regions, the prison population most suffers from the absence of documentation.