Black people with disabilities are more vulnerable to discrimination and prejudice, and this includes the whole issue around “racial profiling”, a practice used by police or public security authorities, which consists of subjecting Black and peripheral people to “stops” or police investigations, instead of relying on concrete evidence of criminal behavior or threats to public safety, and is the clearest manifestation of structural racism in our society.
In recent years, the Vidas Negras com Deficiência Importam (VNDI) movement has observed growing violence against Black people with disabilities by public authorities, one of the most emblematic cases occurring in 2022, when Genivaldo de Jesus Santos, a Black man with a disability, was stopped, beaten and killed inside an improvised gas chamber during a Federal Highway Police stop.
That same year, 27-year-old Rhuan do Nascimento, a resident of Barreira do Vasco, a community in São Cristóvão, in the North Zone of Rio de Janeiro, who was also a Black person with a disability, was killed during a police operation.
The deaf young man Leonardo Bezerra, a resident of Nova Iguaçu, also in Rio de Janeiro, was beaten by the police and arrested after being considered a suspect in the theft of a cell phone. Cases like these have become increasingly frequent, especially when it comes to people whose disabilities affect social skills and/or communication.
It is important to remember that racial profiling is an illegal and discriminatory practice that has been widely condemned by international organizations and civil society and is contrary to the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD), adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in 1965, and also to the Inter-American Convention against Racism, Racial Discrimination and Related Forms of Intolerance, signed by Brazil in Guatemala on June 5, 2013 and promulgated in 2021 with the status of a constitutional amendment.
In its text, the CERD states that all signatory States must take measures to ensure that all individuals enjoy human rights and fundamental freedoms without discrimination of any kind, including racial discrimination. In addition, States Parties must condemn racial discrimination and take effective measures to prevent, prohibit and eliminate all forms of racial discrimination.
The Inter-American Convention requires governments to combat racism by authorities and not to use discriminatory criteria in their measures, including security measures.
Fortunately, in recent years, racial profiling has been an increasingly present topic in discussions on human rights and racial discrimination, and recently a case that could have major repercussions in the fight against this practice was placed on the agenda of the Federal Supreme Court (STF): Habeas Corpus No. 208,240, filed by the Public Defender’s Office of the State of São Paulo, concerning a Black man who was the target of a personal search considered racist, in which the police found 1.5 grams of cocaine. In his defense, the Public Defender’s Office questions the legality of the stop, based only on “reasonable suspicion”, which currently authorizes the police to approach any individual on the basis of subjective criteria such as place, behavior, ethnicity or race, which violates the constitutional principles of equality and non-discrimination.
If successful, the case could be an important step in the fight against the mass incarceration of Black people and against police violence committed against these individuals in law enforcement.
The trial is being closely followed by everyone who cares about the protection of human rights and believes that racial profiling must end so that everyone can be treated with justice and equality.
The Vidas Negras com Deficiência Importam (VNDI) Movement hopes that the STF will rule against racial profiling and promote appropriate measures to combat racism and discrimination, aiming to guarantee the protection of the rights and lives of all Black people in our country and to contribute to the search for a just, egalitarian society that can ensure that the lives of people with disabilities are protected regardless of skin color.
