Sexual exploitation

Regarding the criminal activities that affect the lives of women, the Public Prosecutor and professor explained that the large amount of men who arrived, had attracted criminals involved in human trafficking of women and female teens, provoking the establishment of brothels in the city and near the barrack areas for the workers. A respondent from the Federal Public Ministry explained that there is a dark tradition in Altamira and the surrounding region, of child abuse and prostitution that also involves poor families. The public attorney said:

“Historically, we have many cases of violence against women, not only in Altamira, but also in the communities along the river. And from this tradition derives sexual abuse of children. There are families that sell/ give in their young daughters to prostitution. This is very common.” (R14MPF)

The respondent from the university affirmed this information, and conveyed a case he had come across during a study they had undertaken at the university, about the issue of sexual exploitation of children, teenagers and women in the region:

“There was this case of a family, that sent their young daughter, minor of age, she was only 13 or14 years old, by taxy to a brothel where she worked as a prostitute, until the taxi picked her up after a day’s work and took her home.” (R12PROF)

Then he gave some general information about the situation of the women that had come to work in the brothels on false conditions:

“We have found a big rise in the situation of traffic of persons, especially with people arriving from the south-east region and the south of Brazil. They come here to this region with the promise of earning 15.000 Reais per week, not per month, but per week. But what they really get involved in is a situation of exploitation and slave-work with minimal living conditions. We saw this in Boate³ Xingu after a police ride in February.” (R12PROF)

The public prosecutors and the professor explained that there is a connection between big construction projects and increase of sexual exploitation. All of them referred to a police ride against a nightclub in 2013, that was ordered by the Federal Public Ministry. In the

investigation that followed, they found that the nightclub was a residential brothel where the owner formed part of a human trafficking group that operated nationally. The brothel itself, was a direct consequence of the construction of the Belo Monte dam, an upshot established as an effect of the large migration of men to the city. The professor explained:

“In the case of the Xingu Nightclub in February 2013, we concluded that there is a connection between sexual exploitation and the big construction projects. Under the investigation, we gathered all the documents we could obtain concerning the Xingu Nightclub, including owner’s bank accounts, staff network and so on, and we mapped the trajectory of this brothel and realized that it was linked to a series of other dams.

The owner had already been active for more than 20 years, going from dam site to dam site, setting up brothels because he knew that it would attract reliable users. We also found that he fled, either when the construction project ended or when he got arrested by the police or by law enforcement sectors. And despite the clear evidences,

3 Boate = night club.

like in the case of Xingu Nightclub, this man was never arrested nor punished. His court proceeding has already been concluded here, including a federal judge decision.

The judge condemned him for sexual exploitation, but not for human trafficking and slave labour practices like the Prosecutor´s Office had filed against him. This judge did not recognize that those situations were present. We completely disagree based on the testimonials given by the women, not all of them though, we have to admit, but according to the women that had arrived from Paraná, from the Calipial Nightclub, and women that lived in the brothel, but originally came from Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina and Paraná states to work in that nightclub and from there they came to Altamira. They’ve demonstrated well how they were cheated as they were promised 30,000 BRL for two months’ work and they didn´t even receive more than 900 BRL throughout the whole period. Also, they were cheated in relation to housing facilities.

They were told they would have the same conditions as they had at the previous Nightclubs, but what they had here was a sort of private incarceration, violation to their right of freedom and dignity.” (R12PROF)

He concluded:

“What concerns us is the existence of a connection, which is well founded. And this man (owner of club), for instance, might have gone to Tapajós from here. This does not obviously involve only him, but a wider network, he is only a part of this

network… we have not yet mapped this network. We do not know what are the several faces of this network of sexual exploitation which is increasingly becoming part of the big dam projects, being embedded in the dynamics of men migration to these big projects, increasingly negatively impacting the situation of women and girls that have been sexually exploited by these networks.” (R12PROF)

Regarding public policies that could prevent or reduce the extent of human trafficking and sexual exploitation such as police controls, a respondent spoke about the reduced capacity of the federal police force that at that time (2013) was functioning with only eleven policemen in the department. Therefore, they didn´t have the capacity to do more than a minimum of control along the Trans-Amazonian Highway and the activities established near the dam.

Before Belo Monte, the police arranged operations to investigate restaurants, bars and hostels by the road. With the dam, the problem of sexual exploitation expanded while the police controls reduced to a minimum. The demand for policemen grew a lot, but the State didn´t

guarantee a service. According to the respondent from the public prosecutor´s office, it is also difficult for the police and legal system to find people who commit sexual crimes. He

explained the current situation regarding this issue in Altamira:

“The company is not interested in having criminal people as employees, so if this happens they simply sack the person, and then it is difficult for us to find the person in question. There is a large flux of workers who enter and leave. Some commits crimes, sexually abuse and even kill, and then they go back to their home-state, and it is impossible to track them.” (R15PPO).

A respondent from the university explained that the same problems occurred in regions with the construction of large dams:

“Altamira and this region is not a singular case in this respect. In May this year, I attended a meeting/ conference on sexual exploitation in the context of the

construction of large infrastructures (large construction projects). In this meeting, a group of representatives from Rio Madera (dam), Gerai Santo Antonio and Barajó here in Pará - de las ajozeros in the buffalo industry, which also are big

constructions/ alterations. The situation is repeated in these places too, because the same developing model implemented in these regions. This is a situation that reoccur in the Amazon since the construction of the Tucuruí dam at least, in which was the first large project that was implemented by the military government in the Amazon in the 1970s, and has been repeated many times.” (R12PROF)