Brazilian Prisons

Two days a week I visit woman in prison in Brazil.  On Wednesday we have a health class for elderly woman at a prison called Santa Anna, the woman in this class are all Brazilian and are moms and grandmas.  Friday we have a similar health class at a prison called Capital, the woman in this class are young.  Four of the woman are pregnant, one woman is from Bolivia but does not even speak Spanish, she only speaks her own tribal language; three woman are from Thailand, a handful are from Brazil, and a few are from South Africa.  One thing that not all but most have in common, drug trafficking.

The three woman from Thailand are so sweet.  They don't speak Portuguese and only know what little English they learned in High School.  Last week they told me they had been prison for 1 month & 10 days.  The class we do is in Portuguese and English.  Because many of the foreigners understand English and may not have picked up Portuguese yet.  The other missioners lead the class because I still cannot teach in Portuguese.  But I have really enjoyed being able to help the English speakers in the group.  Sometimes I translate the Portuguese for them and sometimes I need to break down words in English to make it easier to understand.  After our last class I was speaking with my friends from Thailand.  The woman were joking with each other and hugging each other.  I asked them if they knew each other before they came to Brazil.  They told me they had met in the airport when they were each being arrested.

One thing we don't do is ask them about their crime,  if they offer information we can talk to them but we don't begin that conversation.  They did not tell me anymore, however, I assumed that they were being arrested for drug trafficking.  Later, one of the other missioners told me a little more of their story.  All three had been hired in Thailand to come to Brazil.  They took different routes here but arrived on the same day.  They each stayed in different hotels for one month.  Then they were given drugs that they swallowed or put in their body cavities.  They arrived at the airport at different times but were booked on the same flight home.  One was arrested around 8am, another 9am, and the last 10am.  This pattern leads us to believe that they had been set up.  Many times drug traffickers set up decoys to be arrested so someone who has more drugs can get through security while the authorities have been tipped off about the decoys and are busy arresting them.

The woman now will spend several years in prison, yes they are guilty of drug trafficking but from what I know of them I would guess they come from poverty.  These are the woman we meet in the Brazilian prisons.  Very poor, simple woman who broke the law as a means of survival.  We don't meet the major drug traffickers, or the rich who buy the drugs, only the poor.  I am sure that some of the others do get arrested but I have not met them yet.

Catherine & Katie holding the
names of the men who were
killed at Carandiru Prison.

Last week was the 20th anniversary of a massacre at the Carandiru prison.  111 prisoners were executed by the police after a riot.  Reports show that the prisoners had surrendered and that no one had tried to escape.  Yet the police were ordered to enter the prison and kill many of the prisoners.  Carandiru was destroyed in the 90s.  Now there is a park in its place.  This park separates the two prisons I visit.  Carandiru was a men's prison and the men were moved elsewhere.   You can watch the movie of what happened on You Tube (however it is in Portuguese) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wn4HYrt1-sM or I got a copy from the library and watched it with English subtitles.  It is very violent so don't watch with kids. You can also skipped to the end on You Tube and just watch what happened and not get the back stories of the prisoners.

Many of the Maryknoll Lay Missioners in Brazil attended the memorial for the prisoners killed at Carandiru.  7 out of 8 of us work in prison ministry.  Our work is about human rights and human dignity.  A person does not deserve to be killed simply because they are a prisoner.  A woman deserves to give birth to her baby without her hands and feet handcuffed to a bed, and everyone deserves food, water and basic shelter.  I believe that all humans beings have the right to life, even the prisoner.

Me @ the memorial

Heidi being interviewed about
the massacre at Carandiru.