Mental Health and Public Safety in Times of 'Pepper Spray on Vagrants'

Last week, a video of the graduation ceremony of the São Paulo Metropolitan Civil Guard gained prominence on social media. In it, agents and representatives of the municipal executive branch chanted, as a battle cry, the phrase: "Pepper spray in the face of thugs." The episode generated strong public repercussions and raised questions about the direction of public security policies and the relationship between official discourse and police practice. 

Brazil still ranks among the countries with the highest homicide rates in the world. However, the state of São Paulo began a consistent trajectory of reducing intentional violent deaths starting in 1999. In that year, the homicide rate was 44 per 100 inhabitants. In 2021, according to the Atlas of Violence (2024), this rate fell to 6,6 per 100 inhabitants, well below the national average. 

This change is not due to a single factor, but to a combination of elements. Among them, the aging population, the regulation promoted by the Disarmament Statute, and the monopoly of violence exercised by groups such as the PCC stand out. However, what consolidated this trajectory was a series of innovative public policies based on scientific evidence.

Among the innovations highlighted by the Atlas of Violence (2024) are: the adaptation of the Japanese community policing model, which significantly reduced crime in neighborhoods such as Jardim Ângela; the creation of Infocrim in the early 2000s, inspired by systems such as CompStat in the United States, which brought greater efficiency to policing through crime mapping and georeferenced analysis; and, more recently, the Olho Vivo project, with the use of body cameras, a practice influenced by similar initiatives implemented in the United Kingdom and the United States. These actions were positively evaluated both for the improvement in police conduct and for the perception of public safety.

In recent years, we have witnessed a worrying reversal in the trajectory of violence reduction in the state of São Paulo. Although the state maintains the lowest homicide rate in the country, with 7,8 per 100 inhabitants, there has been an increase in deaths due to police intervention, rising from 407 cases between January and October 2023 to 676 in the same period of 2024, returning to 2020 levels, prior to the implementation of body cameras. Simultaneously, the number of suicides among São Paulo military police officers reached a record high in 2023, with 31 cases registered, representing 28,2% of all police officer suicides nationwide.

Recent incidents, such as the death of the Deputy Secretary of Security and Urban Control of Osasco, Adilson Custódio Moreira, during a meeting at the city hall, a victim of shots fired by a municipal civil guard; Operation Shield in Baixada Santista, which resulted in an alarming number of deaths; and the regrettable episode in which a military police officer was caught throwing a citizen off a bridge, highlight a worrying escalation of violence and lack of control within the security forces themselves.

I regularly treat police officers in my clinical practice and I can confidently say that most of them neither desire nor approve of the outbursts of excessive violence that have been encouraged by some public officials as a way to please a radicalized segment of the electorate. Urban violence is undoubtedly one of the biggest problems facing Brazil and generates outrage in all of us. However, it is essential to remember that the crime rate has been reduced when security policies have been based on evidence and guided by results.

Discouraging the use of firearms, investing in intelligence to combat organized groups, and implementing preventative measures have historically been the cornerstones of reducing violence in the state of São Paulo. Reverting to practices based on brute force and populist rhetoric compromises not only the work of a generation of managers and police officers, but also the very safety of the population.

Brazil needs a security policy that values ​​lives, whether those of ordinary citizens, victims of crime, or police officers themselves. Responsible governance is one that recognizes the value of scientific evidence and rejects appeals to violent populism.

Let us not be swayed by war cries that silence reason.