Cacique Serere sees his health deteriorating

At around 6:30 pm on December 12, 2022, 42-year-old indigenous leader José Acácio Serere Xavante was detained by the Federal Police in Brasília. He was accused of leading demonstrations questioning the result of the presidential elections and criticizing Federal Supreme Court (STF) ministers Alexandre de Moraes and Luís Roberto Barroso. The Federal Public Ministry (MPF) then requested the temporary arrest for five days in order to guarantee public order.

Minister Moraes decreed temporary arrest, but for ten days. “This attitude affronts the Public Prosecutor’s Office (MP), which, according to Article 129 of the Constitution, is in charge of the criminal action”, argues Geovane Veras, Serere’s defense lawyer. “It was an abuse of power, reinforced by the decision to convert the temporary detention into pre-trial detention, a function that does not belong to him. Not even the Attorney General’s Office (PGR) asked for the conversion of the temporary prison into a preventive one”.

Almost nine months have passed and the indigenous man is still in prison. In May, the PGR filed a complaint with the STF against the indigenous person for violating article 286 of the Penal Code, which mentions the offense of inciting crime, with a penalty of 3 to 6 months of detention – or the payment of a fine. Veras informs that the PGR has already issued an opinion that transfers the competence to judge the indigenous to the Federal Court of first instance, since it does not have a privileged forum.

“Alexandre de Moraes did not even receive the complaint from the PGR, which means that Serere is arrested without formally taking action, based only on an investigation initiated by the minister himself. We asked for release several times, with no response. The chief is being humiliated and his most basic rights are being neglected”, he accuses. When contacted, the STF and the Brazilian Bar Association (OAB) did not respond. The PGR informed via a press office: “The case is under secrecy in the Federal Public Ministry system, so we do not have access to the information.”

small children

The lawyer has been in contact with the client, who is being held at the Papuda Penitentiary Complex, in Brasília – the place received twice the capacity of detainees after the arrests resulting from the January 8 acts. “He has type 2 diabetes, his vision is blurry, his legs are trembling and his mouth is dry. His diet is not adequate for his health conditions and he is rapidly losing weight, in addition to showing signs of depression”, says Veras. “Often, to avoid eating cookies, he eats the banana for dessert at lunch and saves the peel to eat at night, it becomes his dinner”. The native’s private doctor, Nicole Tanoue Hasegawa, produced a report in which she points out that he is at risk of suffering kidney failure.

Sererê lives in a village near the municipality of Campinópolis (MT). He is a pastor, president of the Tsihorira and Pahoriware Mitsipe Mission Churches and the direct successor of the chief of his community, where he is also head of ceremonial, which means that he organizes the ceremonies for the passage of young people into adulthood.

He is the father of six children, four of whom are minors and all are financially dependent on him. “In his role preaching the word of God, he contributes to treating depression and drug addiction in many young people in the region, who now resent his absence”, claims the lawyer. Furthermore, his status as an indigenous person could place him in a scenario where imprisonment would not be recommended.

“Inhuman decision”

In fact, the 1973 Statute of the Indian recommends that the penalty for the case of a criminal offense committed by indigenous people be mitigated and the punishment, as far as possible, carried out in a semi-open regime or close to the accused’s home, where he would stay under the supervision of the National Indian Foundation (Funai).

If it appears that he was accustomed to the urban environment, considering that he had already run for mayor and was circulating in Brasília with ease, he could, in theory, be arrested. Incidentally, when he was arrested for drug trafficking in 2008, he was sentenced by the Court of Justice of Mato Grosso to four years and eight months in a closed regime, but ended up released from the closed regime in 2009, by determination of the Superior Court of Justice (STJ ), who considered his condition as an indigenous person to make the decision.

Even so, considering the context of Serere’s stay in Papuda, maintaining the prison, argues Geovane Veras, “is a disproportionate, unfair, inhumane and, above all, illegal decision”.

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