Violência doméstica contra crianças e adolescentes: os (des) caminhos entre a denúncia e a proteção

Abstract

Introduction: domestic violence against children and adolescents is a severe public health problem. It has attracted the attention of the researchers due to its magnitude and frequency as well as the scientific recognitionof the consequences for the victims. Besides it has a strong financial impact on the judicial and health system. Objective: Evaluate the development of lawsuits related to physical and sexual domestic violence against children and adolescents who were referred to psychosocial evaluation and psychosocial interventions in the Civil Court of Childhood and Youth in the city of Belo Horizonte from 2002 to 2003. Method: this is an analytical cross-sectional study. All lawsuits involving physical and sexual domestic violence against children and adolescents referred to psychosocial evaluation and psychosocial interventions in the Civil Court of Childhood and Youth in the city of Belo Horizonte from 2002 to 2003 were analyzed. All lawsuits in which psychosocial evaluation and psychosocial interventions were applied were evaluated for inclusion in this research. Inclusion criteria were: domestic violence and sexual violence against children and adolescents. The datacollection protocol consisted of information about the acts of violence, the victims, the reporters of the violence, the offenders and the development of the lawsuit. The chi-square and the Kruskal-Wallis test were used to analyze the results with a significance level of 5%. Results: In total there were 77 cases of domestic, physical and/ or sexual violence registered at the Civil Court of Childhood and Youth in Belo Horizonte in 2002 and 2003, a 134 victims were involved and 78 aggressors. Of these 134 victims a 107 (79.8%) children and / or adolescents were victims of physical violence, 15 (11.2%) of sexual assault and 12 (8.9%) of physical and sexual violence. In the lawsuits studied, the victims had a median age of 9.1 years, 57.5% were girls. The aggressors were male in 61.5% of the cases and in 69.2% of the case the aggressor was one of the biological parents. Physical violence was significantly more common in households with three or more children and sexual violence wasmore common in households with fewer children (p = 0.03). A larger proportionof the biological parents were involved in physical violence (p<0.01) in comparison to sexual violence. At the time of the complaint the reporter, reported a confirmationof the violence in 46.7% of the cases, and suspected of occurring in 53.3% of cases. During the lawsuit only 10.7% of the complaints were not confirmed. The median time between the registration of the complaint and the initiation of the process at the Civil Court of Childhood and Youth - start of lawsuit - was 2.7 months. The median time interval between the beginning of the process and the sentence was 30.4 months. When the complaints had been referred to child protection agencies, themedian interval between registration of the complaint and initiation of thelawsuit was 9.4 months. The duration of the lawsuits was not associated with the type ofviolence, neither with the nature of the measurements applied by social services, nor with the fact that a legal process was started against the aggressors. In 49 of 77 cases (63.6%) sentences were given to the offender: 44 aggressors (57.1%) were sentenced to receive health and family support and five aggressors (6.4%) lost the authority over their children and teenagers. Of the 134 victims involved, in 66 cases(49.5%) measurement were taken to provide family and health support, 37 victims (27.6%) were removed from their home (n = 26) and placed in a foster family (n = 11). Conclusion: This study showed a high percentage of confirmed complaints without a corresponding conviction of the perpetrators. The disconnection between the complaint and the protection of children and adolescents is revealed.Family life becomes, in many cases, the main risk factor for them, since the judicial system cannot guarantee their rights.