A Supreme Court decision awarding damages to a photographer blinded while covering a protest highlights how attacks on journalists can discourage them from doing essential work.
Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court ordered the state of São Paulo to pay 100,000 reais (about US$20,000) in damages and a lifetime pension to a freelance photographer who was blinded in one eye while covering a protest.
The ruling ends a yearslong legal battle for photographer Sérgio Silva, who was struck in his left eye in June 2013 as police used rubber bullets to crack down on demonstrations against a rise in bus fares in São Paulo. Silva had spent more than a decade unsuccessfully seeking compensation from the state.
“It’s been 13 years — not 13 days or 13 minutes,” Silva told LatAm Journalism Review (LJR) moments after the decision. “Finally, that’s over… I’m really relieved.”
Despite the fact that forensic examinations did not conclude Silva’s injury was caused by a rubber bullet, Justice Alexandre de Moraes, who led the case for the court, said the São Paulo state government had failed to provide enough evidence to absolve itself of responsibility. Other journalists were also attacked during the same protest.
“When the State fails to protect these professionals [journalists], it assumes strict liability for the damages they suffer,” Moraes said in a statement published by the court.
The court overruled a 2016 decision from São Paulo state court that refused to compensate Silva, and determined he was responsible for his being shot because he was in the “line of fire between police and protesters.”
In 2017, a São Paulo Court of Justice denied an appeal from Silva, arguing he couldn’t prove he had been shot by the police. Silva had first filed a lawsuit in October 2013.
The Supreme Court did not debate the evidence in the case but rather the interpretation of it, Silva’s lawyer, Lucas Andreucci, told LJR.
“That was crucial,” Andreucci said. “We were able to show that there was sufficient evidence regarding the state’s liability, and the state was unable to demonstrate that its agents acted in accordance with the protocols required by that type of situation.”
Media advocacy groups – including the Committee to Protect Journalists, or CPJ, and the National Federation of Journalists, or FENAJ – celebrated the ruling.“Silva was simply doing his job when he was the victim of violence,” Cristina Zahar, Latin America program coordinator at CPJ, said in a statement.
The ruling was a milestone in holding public officials accountable for acts of violence against media professionals, FENAJ added in a statement.
This is not the first such case in Brazil. This latest decision follows the case of photographer Alexandro Wagner Oliveira da Silveira, who was also hit by a rubber bullet fired by police in São Paulo during a protest in 2000, and was also blinded in his left eye. The Supreme Court in 202 ruled he was entitled to compensation from the state government.
These rulings carry a significant symbolic meaning, said freelance photojournalist Priscila Ribeiro.
“We photojournalists who work in this field know that our job requires us to be very close to people, very close to the events unfolding,” she told LJR. “And when we feel afraid, when we feel violated in some way, I think it’s not just the professional who suffers as a result. I think it’s society as a whole.”
Silva is unlikely to receive compensation in the immediate future. The state can still appeal the ruling, and the pension amount must first go through expert review and calculation before any payment is made, according to Silva’s lawyer, Lucas Andreucci.
