Officials: Teen girl gang-raped in Brazilian jail

Group: 'Extensive reports' of jail abuse
Days after the case was divulged, the Brazilian Bar Association announced that a 23-year-old woman had been obliged to share a cell with 70 men in a police detention center in Parauapebas, in southern Para. It was not clear if she was forced to have sex.

Para Gov. Ana Julia Carepa said she was outraged by the alleged abuse at Abaetetuba. She suspended three top police officials pending an investigation and promised that the guilty parties would be “punished in exemplary fashion.”

The federal government on Friday sent a task force of human rights officials to Belem to accompany the investigation after the girl and her family reported receiving death threats.

“First we will guarantee the safety of the minor, who will be included in the program for the Protection of Children and Adolescents threatened with death,” Marcia Ustra Soares, a director of the program, told reporters.

'Hidden victims'
Amnesty International said Brazilian women “are the hidden victims of a crumbling detention system,” and many cases of women abused under government custody go unreported or uninvestigated.

“We receive extensive reports of women in detention who suffer sexual abuse, torture, substandard health care and inhuman conditions,” said Tim Cahill, Amnesty’s researcher on Brazil.

Carepa said the government also was investigating reports that the girl was arrested purposely for the sexual gratification of the prisoners.

“This is an unfortunate practice that regrettably has been occurring for some time,” she said. “But it would be good to make this public, so that all society will be mobilized and we can end these practices. ... We won’t allow this to happen again.”

The Brazilian Bar Association voiced skepticism that officials would take effective action, and Britto said if the government cannot provide separate jails for women, then those citizens must be released.

“What has happened in the state of Para’s prison system shows that for authorities the concept of human dignity is only useful as a rhetorical instrument, not something to be taken seriously,” Britto said.

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