Pregnant women will no longer await trial in Brazilian Jails

News

Pregnant women will no longer await trial in Brazilian Jails

26 February 2018

By Andre Carvalho

The word “victory” is rarely uttered alongside the word “prisons” in Brazil, where even pre-trial detainees are routinely held in overcrowded, unsanitary and violent cells. But this week, Brazil´s Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling that pregnant women, mothers of children up to the age of 12 and of persons with disabilities, accused of non-violent crimes, should await trial under house arrest not in detention.

The ruling offers some relief to moms like Jéssica Monteiro, a 24-year-old with no criminal record arrested on February 10 in São Paulo allegedly with 90 grams of marijuana and thrown into a filthy police precinct cell, despite the fact that she was 39-weeks pregnant. The next day she went into labor and was taken to hospital. In a hearing held in Monteiro´s absence, a judge ruled she should remain in jail pending her trial. On February 13, police returned her to the cell, where she slept on a mattress on the floor with her newborn. The public outcry led to her release pending trial.