The Production of Memory in the Judicial Archives of Prison Massacres in Brazil – Manaus (2017) and Altamira (2019)

This work is part of a PhD research agenda in law and state violence, focusing on investigating the phenomenon of prison lethality and memorialization in Brazil. It is a study that employs qualitative research methods and a documentary collection composed of judicial archives concerning two prison massacre contexts in the Brazilian Amazon region, in the states of Amazonas and Pará, referring to the years 2017 and 2019, when more than one hundred people died, were injured, or suffered trauma while in state custody. The legal and sociological dimensions surrounding these prison massacre contexts also reveal a space of contradictions when observed from the perspective of state violence. On the one hand, legal norms, institutions, and judicial processes reproduce state violence. On the other hand, these components represent possibilities for recognition, accountability, and reparation concerning the state and other institutions and individuals connected to these massacre contexts. This study will be developed considering the coexistence of intrinsic contradictions, aiming to reconstruct the narrative of the massacres by utilizing judicial archives as a memory collection in these contexts. Interpreting and understanding judicial archives as memory collections will investigate these prison massacre contexts from a short, medium, and long-term perspective. The study will detail the tensions leading up to the deaths, the roles of state institutions in the face of extreme violence, and the aftermath of these events, including practices of memorialization and community traumas within the Brazilian prison system and in these cities in the Amazon region. Finally, ongoing research findings will be presented, including the concept of "uncomfortable memory" in prison massacre contexts and the role of law in addressing state violence.