The exercise of authority during interactions in custody hearings in São Paulo (Brazil): Building legitimacy through exclusion

Abstract

In Brazil, the Custody Hearing is a legal device established in 2015 to safeguard the rights of people arrested in flagrante delicto by the police. In an attempt to prevent the indiscriminate use of preventive detentions in the country, the custody hearings were created for the potential effects that an in-person meeting may have on the flow of the Criminal Justice System. While the recent literature on criminology has produced significant empirical data testing the effects of peoples’ evaluations of procedural justice during court hearings for institutional legitimacy, little is known about what happens during these situations of contact between citizens and judicial actors. Using data from the observation of 138 custody hearings at the largest Criminal Forum in Brazil, we analyzed in this work how interaction procedures and ceremonial resources are employed by judicial actors to exercise authority. By focusing on the quality of decision-making and the interpersonal treatment expressed in procedures, we sought to analyze the effects of the punitive framework for the construction of legitimacy. Our analysis of interactions in custody hearings indicates the existence of a claim to legitimacy which, counter to procedural justice principles, develops through the exclusion of the person subjected to that authority.