Violência e cárcere: perfil das mulheres presas em Pedrinhas

Abstract

The penitentiary system results in the strengthening of a cycle of violence, where the involvement of women in crime and violence is increasingly explicit. This generates an increase in the number of women imprisoned, contributing to mass incarceration. The growth in the number of women incarcerated in Brazil demonstrates that crime, imprisonment, and violence are increasingly evident in the country. However, there are few female penitentiaries in Brazil, most are mixed. Those aimed at women are largely adaptations of men's prisons. Penitentiaries built for women are few, and this is the case of the Pedrinhas female prison, the location of this study. The objective of the research was to characterize the profile of women in the penal situations in Pedrinhas female prison, Maranhão. A bibliographical search of books, articles, websites, and magazines was carried out, as well as the tabulation of secondary data taken from the website of the Instituto Maranhense de Estudos Socioeconômicos e Cartográficos (IMESC), Departamento Penitenciário Nacional (DEPEN), Sistemas de Informações do Departamento Penitenciário Nacional (SISDEPEN), National Prison Information Survey, and from interviews carried out with the inmates and agents for the preparation of the material. The results indicate that the profile of the female prisoners in Pedrinhas is linked to the social class system and the relationship with crime starts with the lack of opportunities