Pompeo de Mattos: worry with preservation of anonymity, integrity and privacy of investigated people

On Tuesday (16), bodies that are favorable to the decriminalization of abortion handed to the special secretary of Human Rights, Minister Paulo Vanucchi, a report which points out violations suffered by 10,000 women, who are being investigated for the practice of abortion in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul.

The handing of the document took place in Brasilia, during the 11th National Conference on Human Rights. Representatives of the NGOs Ipas Brasil, Centro Feminista de Estudos e Assessoria (Feminist Center for Studies and Assistance, Cfemea) and Católicas pelo Direito de Decidir (Catholics for the Right to Decide) criticized the lawsuit against women who are accused of having practiced abortions in a clandestine clinic in the city of Campo Grande.

According to the report, the process would have violated the rights to privacy, to health, to freedom and to the due legal procedure, provided for in the Constitution.

Anonymity
The president of the Committee on Human Rights and Minorities, Deputy Pompeo de Mattos (PDT-RS), agreed with the content of the document. “I was in Campo Grande, and got worried with the preservation of the integrity, intimacy of the people who were supposedly involved. The anonymity of the women should be preserved; they cannot have their names thrown in the wind to be execrated, without absolutely no evidence, because of a unilateral accusation”, he highlighted.

According to him, the suspicion about the practice of 10,000 abortions in an only clinic shows that the issue is not in the scope of law and police, but of politics and public health.

Irregularities in the process
Beatriz Galli, of Ipas Brasil – a body which works for the reduction of maternal mortality due to unsafe abortion – affirmed that the document submitted to the minister denounces irregularities in the legal process: “The objective is to sensitize the authorities, for them to make urgent and immediate arrangements to remedy these violations, including by extinguishing criminal lawsuits and paralyzing investigations.”

According to her, around 1,500 to 2,000 people could be convicted, if the lawsuit continues. She affirms that the evidences were illegally obtained, by means of the seizure of forms that belonged to the women.

Report - Paulo Roberto Miranda/Rádio Câmara
Editing - João Pitella Junior
Translation – Positive Idiomas Ltda