Projection points to 6% drop in murders in 2023

Brazil’s Ministry of Justice and Public Security estimates that the number of murders, including femicides, recorded this year should be nearly six percent lower than the total in 2022. The information was announced Thursday (Dec. 21) by Minister Flávio Dino.

“We have a trend, almost a confirmation, of a reduction of around six percent [5.7%] in the so-called intentional lethal violent crimes,” he said while presenting a preliminary assessment of the ministry’s efforts this year.

The minister warned that the results released Thursday are not yet definitive, as they do not take into account data from the last few weeks. Even so, Minister Dino decided to use the ceremony, aimed at handing over more than 700 police vehicles to the states, to present some of the results, since he will be leaving the ministry at the beginning of January to take office as Supreme Court justice.

“In 2021, we had 42,721 intentional lethal violent crimes. In 2022, we had 42,620. For this year, our most pessimistic projection is 40,173 cases,” he said, noting that 36,854 occurrences of this nature were recorded across the country between January and the beginning of November.

According to the National Council of the Prosecution Service, intentional lethal violent crimes encompass intentional homicides (including femicide), bodily injury followed by death, and robbery followed by homicide. The category is said to have been created by the National Secretariat for Public Security with the aim of aggregating crimes of greater social relevance, as crimes that result in death “stand out as the main measure of violence.”

“Someone might say the results aren’t spectacular, but I’m not paid to put on a show, I’m paid to implement a public policy in the terms that reality allows,” the minister said, claiming the improvement in violence indicators would occur more quickly if it were up to him.

“Nobody runs a public policy alone. I’m happy with the results. We’re moving in the right direction. [If confirmed, the data] mean that some 2,500 lives were saved. This was achieved by reducing the previous irresponsible gun ownership, demonstrating there is no logical correlation between a higher number of guns and fewer violent deaths or homicides, as some used to argue,” Minister Dino stated.

According to the ministry, the 28,304 guns registered up to November this year are almost 79 percent less than the 135,915 registered in 2022.